Holy Cross girls win first AA OFSAA gold
Hockey team returned to competitive play this year and was crowned best squad in the province
Holy Cross thought it might have a good hockey team when the Hurricanes girls decided to return to competitive play this season. It turns out they were the best AA squad in the province.
Holy Cross captured its first OFSAA AA gold medal for girls hockey with a 2-1 victory over two-time defending champion St. David from Kitchener-Waterloo on Thursday afternoon in Whitby. It was the Hurricanes’ first season icing a competitive team since well before the COVID-19 pandemic.
Molly Farace and Clair Chambers staked the Hurricanes to a 2-0 lead and, after St. David cut the lead to one with 10 minutes remaining, Holy Cross goalie Isabelle Urie shut the door. The Hurricanes had to kill three St. David power plays in the final five minutes including a fiveon-three.
“It’s a pretty special group of kids who came together,” said Craig Hulsman, who coaches the Hurricanes with Jaden Gates and Ian Murray. “I think it means a lot to the development of girls hockey in Peterborough in general. A lot of the girls have played in the city and around the city and came together at our school and were able to perform with the best in the province.”
The girls expressed an interest last year in icing a team and the coaches put together a tournament squad. However, this year they were entered in the Kawartha league.
“They’re a young group still and a high percentage of the team is returning next year,” said Gates. “We didn’t know what we had, but, as the season grew, we just got better and better as a team. We didn’t know how good we could be, but today we found out. It was a phenomenal experience for the girls and I know the coaches are also super pumped.”
Gates said Erie was the backbone to a talented group in front of her.
“She came up huge and when things got a little shaky she kept us solid. Our leadership on this team is incredible. I can’t say enough about our leadership group, getting the girls together and getting everybody focused,” Gates added.
Chambers scored what proved to be the winner.
“We had a rough start to our season, but we worked really hard and had some early morning practices,” said Chambers. “Things all fell into place this week. It took a lot of hard work and we definitely had the girls to do it.”
Farace said the team set a goal at the start of the year to win Kawartha and COSSA championships and to prove itself at OFSAA. It did all that and more.
“We had a lot of work to do and, once we started to get some momentum going and some chemistry, we got a lot of work done systems-wise and breakout-wise, and a whole bunch of team dynamics,” said Farace. “We got a lot closer as a team. Our relationships are very good, and I think we all came together and played for each other this week and throughout the entire year. Coming from not really having a team, we knew it would take a lot of hard work to get where we wanted (to go). our coaches were a really big help in the journey. They would always push us and told us we had the skill and talent on our team to do really good things.”
Katie Belk, Abbi Brumwell and Olivia Cote added assists in the gold-medal match.
The Hurricanes defeated Georgian Bay, 6-2, in the semifinals Thursday morning.
Annalise MacPhee and Belk scored two goals each, while Farace had a goal and an assist and Brumwell two assists in the semifinals. Lily Merrick also scored.
They were 2-0-1 in pool play, including a 5-2 win over St. David, and beat Holy Cross (SOSSA), 3-1, in quarterfinals.