Midget team moves puck well in 10-0 victory

Handing Evansburg an embarrassing 10-0 on the weekend, the Midget A Jasper Bearcats hockey team demonstrated why they finished atop their division this season and received a bye to the second round of the playoffs.

The Bearcats faced off against Evansburg on Sunday, Feb. 3 at the Activity Centre, and came out strong in the first, racking up two goals on 13 shots, while holding Evansburg to only five chances on Jasper’s netminder.

Even though the Bearcats started the second period a man down, they continued to put Evansburg through a hockey clinic racking up another three goals. They were physically dominant, leaving a trail of frustrated and shaken up opponents heading to the visitor’s bench.

Though playing short-handed more often than Evansburg, the Bearcats always appeared to be on the power-play, spending the majority of the game launching slappers from the blue line and pressuring the defenseless Evansburg goal tender.

The soon vanquished Evansburg team took to the ice in the third but were unable to rack up anything other than penalty minutes. Jasper, now with a two-week rest, doesn’t play this weekend because they devoured their opponents on Sunday.

Jasper coach Dennis Zaffino said he thinks the “team played very well. Considering that we haven’t played in three weeks,” he said, “they moved the puck relatively well.” Throughout the entire game, Jasper cycled the puck well and one-timers looked like second nature to Jasper’s boys.

For most of the third, Evansburg’s coach could be heard shouting at his players – taking a page out of Mike Keenan’s coaching manual – but his apoplectic vocal efforts were to no avail.

With about four minutes to go in the third, Evansburg’s frustration erupted in a small tussle in front of their net, but the Bearcats skated away like gentlemen, preferring to show them the score as opposed to their claws.

Goals were scored by assistant captain Russell Turner, who netted four, Jayton Paul, Jordan Trepaier, assistant captain Jordie Kocon netted two, assistant captain Brandon Macdougall, and Griffin Shea, with the Bearcats out-shooting Evansburg 53 to 20.