Pats reach final at home
REGINA Sam Steel scored the winner in the third period and Max Paddock made 44 saves as the host Regina Pats beat the Hamilton Bulldogs 4-2 on Friday night in the Memorial Cup semifinal.
Regina moves on to face the Acadie-Bathurst Titan of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League on Sunday for the Canadian major junior championship.
Cameron Hebig, Austin Pratt and Jake Leschyshyn, into an empty net, also scored for the Pats.
Regina will try to duplicate what the Windsor Spitfires did last year and become the second straight tournament host to capture the Memorial Cup.
Nicolas Mattinen and Will Bitten found the back of the net for Hamilton, which won the Ontario Hockey League championship. Kaden Fulcher stopped 20-of-23 shots in defeat.
The Titan had an identical 2-1 record along with both Hamilton and Regina after the round robin, although a higher percentage of goals-for and goals-against gave them an automatic berth in the championship game.
Steel teamed up with Hebig to force a Fulcher turnover and eventually put it into the wide-open net at 14:05 of the third. Steel leads the tournament with 12 points.
Bitten, a Montreal Canadiens prospect, cut the deficit to one at 15:17 when he was sprung on a breakaway and roofed the puck over Paddock’s glove.
Hebig gave Regina the lead 11 minutes into the second when he toe-dragged the puck just above the left face-off circle and sniped one above Fulcher’s blocker.
Much like in the tournament opener between the two teams, Paddock was solid in net and made several key stops when he had to.