The Williams Lake Atom Development Timberwolves secured their home turf during the weekend at the team’s home tournament.
The T-wolves skated to a gold medal Sunday morning in the championship of the eight-team tournament, downing the Quesnel Thunder, 9-2, after putting together an unbeaten run leading up to the final.
Scoring in the championship for Williams Lake were Asher Lucas (2G, 2A), Linden Pinette (1G, 1A), Blake Lambe (1G, 1A), Rhys Marchand (1G, 1A), Colton Gerrior (2G) and Neen Suapa (1G).
Goaltenders Jaxson Dikur and Cole Chapman split the duties between the pipes throughout the weekend, which saw Williams Lake win round robin games over the Dawson Creek Canucks, Fort St. John Flyers and Quesnel Thunder in pool ‘A.’
Pool ‘B’ featured a Williams Lake Atom Tournament Team, which competed against the Prince George Bolts, 100 Mile Wranglers and Kamloops Blazers.
“It was a great turnout for the tournament,” said Timberwolves head coach Tyrel Lucas. “And it was awesome to have our atom tournament team.”
READ MORE: Hard work, dedication paying off for atom development T-wolves
One highlight for the weekend, players and coaches agreed, was a skills competition hosted Saturday at the Cariboo Memorial Recreation Complex.
“All the fans just loved it,” Tyrel said. “It was pretty awesome.”
Atom Development Timberwolves players Asher, Linden and Colton agreed, and said it was a lot of fun playing in front of friends, peers and family at their home tournament.
“All the people cheering you on was fun,” Colton said.
“It made it something different and hopefully that will draw more teams to our tournament, and they were all very good sports throughout. It was just an awesome day at the rink,” Tyrel added.
The Williams Lake Atom Tournament Team, meanwhile, lost in the bronze medal game in its pool to 100 Mile, but head coach Graham Fulton said it was a great experience for his players.
“We’ve had just one tournament before down on the Coast where we placed third, and had just a couple practices,” Fulton said.
“They played their hearts out this weekend, and I just want to thank the atom dev team for giving us chance to get into the tournament. It gives all the grandparents and aunts and uncles a chance to see these kids play together they normally wouldn’t get to see.”
Tyrel said the team is now preparing for its year-end wrap up tournament in Osoyoos at the end of the month.
“This will be our biggest challenge of the year, and we’re looking forward to it,” he said.
He noted he’d like to thank all the parents and volunteers for helping put together the tournament.
“Especially our team manager Leslie Rowse. We had some volunteers that went above and beyond to make it an awesome tournament for everyone involved. And I’d really like to thank our coaching staff and all the teams for coming.”
sports@wltribune.com
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