The Williams Lake Midget Timberwolves are headed to the provincial championships.
The lakecity squad thumped the Prince George Midget Cougars 2-1 Friday night and 7-2 Saturday morning to sweep the best-of-three series to determine who would advance to the provincial tournament later this month.
Williams Lake had no shortage of offensive contributions from its entire roster as the team spread around its scoring both games. Head coach Jason Flett, who leads the team alongside assistant coaches Gino D’Appolonia, Chad Enns and Ryan Bailey, also noted a strong defensive effort, both on the blue line and between the pipes, helped the lakecity squad be successful in its bid to reach provincials.
“It’s been a hard effort by all the kids to get to this point,” Flett said. “It’s taken a lot of effort to get to where we’re at, and we’ve come a long way over the year. Congratulations to all the coaching staff and all the kids. It took an entire team effort to get to this point — there’s not one individual that stood out, the goals are spread around — and defensively they’ve come together and done an extraordinary job working together as a team.”
Friday night, Raeyden Beauchamp got the T-wolves on the board first on a setup from Williams Lake captain Cade Enns, before Nolan Nicol, assisted by Jayden Shortreed, notched the game winner for the Timberwolves in the 2-1 victory.
READ MORE: Midget Timberwolves go unbeaten, win gold at Vernon tournament
Saturday, building off their win from the night before, Williams Lake came out flying.
Cade Enns (Beauchamp, Thomas Burke), Marshall Tessaro (unassisted), Burke (Beauchamp), Telford (Thomas, Beauchamp) and Beauchamp each tallied singles for the T-wolves in the winning effort, while Finley Enns lit the lamp twice, including the game winner, on a feed from Telford and Cody Bailey.
Timberwolves netminder Kai Flett picked up both wins in goal on the weekend.
READ MORE: Midget T-wolves host Prince George this weekend with provincial berth on the line
With the victories Williams Lake is now preparing for the upcoming Midget Tier 2 Provincial Championships, being held March 16-20 in Vernon.
Assistant coach Enns, meanwhile, said they’re not quite sure who they will be matched up against at provincials, however, noted it will be a test.
“We’ll be seeing a few of the teams we’ve played so far this year (at provincials),” Enns said, reflecting back on how well the team played this past December when they won a tournament in Vernon — the host of this year’s provincials.
“That was our high point of the season, I think,” he said. “We just played extremely well and kind of walked away with the title. It was a little surprising but we realized at that time how good we can play and how good we can be.
“I think it doesn’t hurt us psychologically we’re going back to Vernon where we had some good success earlier in the year, but we’re going to have to play like that and have everybody going and everybody consistent.”
D’Appolonia, meanwhile, also congratulated the team’s players and said the team’s players have worked hard all year long and were rewarded for their efforts.
Flett thanked the community of Williams Lake for their support for the team, including some fantastic support received from local businesses and residents during a fundraising pub night in November.
“Thanks to minor hockey for supporting the team to get to be this far,” he said. “And thanks to the Williams Lake community for supporting them. We had a lot of fans in the stands on Friday and Saturday, which is nice to see and have that support. The kids put in a lot of effort and a lot of time so it’s nice to have support.”
sports@wltribune.com
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