TWO PR TEAMS CONTINUE NCJHL PLAYOFFS BATTLE

It’s game over now for the Vankleek Hill Cougars in the National Capital Junior Hockey League’s season playoffs series.

Saint-Isidore and Clarence Creek, however, each have a chance to move up to the next round in the series. They can only achieve this if they can win the tie-breaker games this week against Cumberland and Gatineau.

The Cougars were eliminated over the weekend from the opening round of the National Capital Junior Hockey League (NCJHL) season playoffs series. The Cougars had one win against two for their opponents, the North Dundas Rockets, after the initial series of games over the last weekend of February.

The first weekend of March proved cold comfort for the Cougars as they lost, first at home 4-3 in a heartbreaker over-time game on Friday night, then 4-2 Saturday night at the Chesterville Arena. The weekend left the Rockets with four wins to the Cougars’ one after five games in the best-of-seven set.

It is showdown time Wednesday night, March 7, at the Ray Friel Recreation Complex in Orléans, as the Cumberland Bandits host the Saint-Isidore Aigles in a winnertake-all seventh game in their series, to decide who will move on to the next round in the NCJHL playoffs.

The Aigles won both opening games in the series with the Bandits at the end of February. Then the Bandits rallied with three straight wins and almost looked to ride off with the series until Saint-Isidore had a home-game win Sunday night, over the March 2 weekend, to tie up the series three-all.

Clarence Creek fans have reason to cheer as the Clarence Creek Castors beat the Gatineau Hull-Volant four games to two in their seven-game series of the opening playoffs round.

The Castors won all three of the games in the February portion of the best-of-seven series schedule. Gatineau had a brief rally March 1 and 2, with wins for their efforts against the Castors. The Sunday afternoon game on March 4 finished 3-1 for the Castors, giving them four wins to Gatineau’s two, to end the best-of-seven schedule.

Now the Castors wait to find out who they will face in the next round of the NCJHL