PHOTO: Brett Radford celebrates one of his two goals as team-mates Matt Forchuk (#10) and Logan Ferguson look on during Saturday night’s 4-2 victory over the Olds Grizzlys. – Photo courtesy of Pam Doyle.
UPCOMING HOME GAMES
Friday, Dec. 18 – Fort McMurray Oil Barons – 7 PM
Saturday, Dec. 19 – Lloydminster Bobcats – 7 PM
Brett Radford had a pair of first-period powerplay goals (13 & 14th) to pace the Canmore Eagles to a 4-2 victory over the visiting Olds Grizzlys in Alberta Junior Hockey League action played Saturday night at the Canmore Recreation Centre.
The Eagle victory snapped a four-game losing streak and improved their overall record to 17-12-4. The two points earned in the standings gives the Eagles 38 points on the season and moves them into a tie for third-place in the AJHL Southern Division standings with the Okotoks Oilers.
Kyle Pauls (8th) and Braden Saretsky (12th) had the other Eagle goals while goaltender Ryan Bontorin stopped 41 of 43 Grizzlys shots to earn the win and improve his record to 9-7-2. Bontorin was also selected as the Eagles “Player of the Game”.
“Bontorin was very solid for us tonight and certainly kept us in the game,” said Eagles Head Coach and General Manager Andrew Milne who has not been overly impressed with his club’s performance over the past few weeks. “Our special team play was the difference tonight, and fortunately, we were able to take advantage of our powerplays early in the game.”
Canmore will now enjoy a week of both rest and practice before they wrap-up the 2015 portion of their schedule with a pair of home next weekend against the Fort McMurray Oil Barons (4-24-6) on Friday, December 18 and the Lloydminster Bobcats (24-7-1) on Saturday, December 19. Both games start at 7 PM.
“We’ve played five games in the last nine days, so it will be nice to have a few days of rest and then we’ll get prepared for next weekend,” said Milne. “We have the opportunity to end 2015 on a positive note at home but we’ve had some trouble with Northern Division teams recently so we better be ready for the challenge.”
NOTEBOOK: Thanks very much to everyone who brought a Christmas gift to last night’s game for the Bow Valley Christmas Spirit “Game of Gifts” promotion. It was a big success . . .If you want to purchase a Christmas tree from the club's X-mas tree lot, you better go on Sunday, Dec. 13 as the lot is almost sold out. Sunday’s operating hours are from 11-5 pm and we have just 40 trees remaining out of 369. Thank you very much for your support of this important fund raising event and to MJ Lansdscaping for allowing us to use their lot.