A Force to be reckoned with

Metro West Force defeats Mid-Isle Wildcats to win Atlantic title

Try as it might the Mid-Isle Wildcats couldn’t overcome Taylor Jeffrey’s hat trick and dropped a 4-1 decision to the Metro West Force Sunday in the final of the Atlantic bantam AAA female hockey championship in Charlottetown.

The Force’s win avenged a 3-1 loss on Saturday, which put Mid-Isle into the final, but Jeffrey said the championship victory was the one Metro West wanted.

“It’s incredible, hard to believe, just shocked. We worked so hard to reach our goal all year and we really accomplished it,” said Jeffrey, a first-year forward from Halifax. “(I thought we were in control) once we took the 2-1 lead and started producing more. Our defenceman Rachel Cormier got a beautiful goal, made it 4-1 and really hyped us up.”

Jeffrey, who finished the tourney with five goals and seven points, popped in her first goal four minutes into the first period thanks to a big juicy rebound off the pads of Mid-Isle goalie Emma Arsenault.

A second score came five minutes later when the puck took a funky hop off Mid-Isle’s end boards, went airborne in front of Arsenault and Jeffrey tapped it home out of the air at 9:21 for 2-0 edge.

The plucky Wildcats responded 25 seconds later as the tournament’s top goal-getter Emma Langley broke out on a two-on-one with Shaelynn McCardle. The crafty pair were rewarded with Langley’s ninth goal courtesy of McCardle’s feed and cut the lead to 2-1 after the first period.

In the second, Jeffrey struck for the last time at 13:44 when she rocketed home a wrister from the slot and made things 3-1.

Avery McIsaac earned her second assist of the game.

Cormier, on the power play, made it 4-1 with a seeing-eye point shot that found the back of the net high over Arsenault’s glove and that cemented things.

Arsenault, who graduates to midget next season, played in her last bantam AAA game. She proved a rock despite the four goals. None were cheap. Time after time she made big saves. Maybe her best was a glove robbery following a rebound that landed on the stick of a Force attacker early in the third period, which kept things 3-1.

The beleaguered Albany native faced 47 shots, including 19 in the first frame. Afterwards, she was disappointed but realistic.

“They were all really good goals. I’d like to have them all back, but that’s not going to happen. It’s too bad we didn’t capitalize on our shots, but we left it all out on the ice,” said Arsenault. “The season’s over and it’s a really hard thing to see. A good bunch of girls, basically my family. It’s really hard to say goodbye.”

Metro West’s Lucy Phillips stopped 22-of-23 shots for the win.

McCardle, who’s from Kinkora, was Mid-Isle’s player of the game. Jeffrey earned Metro West’s honours.

In the bronze medal game earlier Sunday, Chloe Hawes scored twice in the third period and Hardy Bradley added a single, breaking open a 2-2 game and securing a 5-2 win for the host Central Storm over the Western Phantoms from New Brunswick.

The Phantoms had a 2-0 lead in the second after goals by Emily Brinston and Kierra St. Peter, but Central’s Meg Aiken and Molly Doyle scored to tie things 2-2 heading into the decisive third frame.

Langley was named the tournament’s top forward at the Atlantics awards banquet while teammate Rachel Richards earned the top defenceman award. Phillips nabbed the top goaltender honour and her teammate Jillian Duggan took home the MVP and top scorer awards.