The Canmore Eagles didn’t get the two points they were hoping for but they did manage to pick up a single point in the Alberta Junior Hockey League Southern Division standings last night as they suffered a tough 4-3 overtime shoot-out loss to the hometown Grande Prairie Storm.
The Eagles jumped out to an early 3-0 first period lead but the Storm took advantage of some Eagle penalty trouble to register two powerplay goals to tie the game up in regulation time and eventually outscored the Eagles 2-1 in the overtime shootout. The game was played before close to 1,500 fans.
Bryan Arneson (5th), Trey Phillips (6th) and Johnny Stevens (1st) had the Eagle goals. Cam Barnes was in the Eagle net and stopped 31 of the 34 Grande Prairie shots he faced.
The single point earned was significant for Canmore as the Eagles now find themselves in fifth-place in the tightly-bunched AJHL Southern Division standings with a record of 6-9-1 and 13 points. Canmore is just one point back of the third-place Drumheller Dragons and Calgary Mustangs.
“The boys came out with lots of jump tonight and played hard throughout the game,” said Eagles Head Coach and General Manager Andrew Milne afterwards. “It was good to see the boys come out ready to play after a terrible effort on Friday night (a 5-2 loss to the Drayton Valley Thunder). Unfortunately, we got ourselves into some penalty trouble last night in the third period and it cost us.“
The Eagles will wrap up their current three-game Northern Division road swing with a difficult game in Whitecourt against the Wolverines (10-5-2) on Sunday afternoon. In their only meeting earlier this year on Sept. 26 at the AJHL Showcase event in Spruce Grove, the Wolverines defeated the Eagles 4-3.
NOTEBOOK: Rookie Kurt Hildebrand had two assists for the Eagles in last night’s game in Grande Prairie and was named the Eagles “Star of the Game”. . . . Canmore called up Grande Prairie Midget AAA player Austin Hrehoruk for last night’s game.
