Provincial final
The St. Albert Gregg Distributors Sabres have home-ice advantage in the Alberta Major Bantam Hockey League provincial final against the Airdrie Extreme.The best-of-five series starts this weekend with the Sabres hosting game one tonight at 8 p.m. and game two Sunday at 1:15 p.m. at Akinsdale Arena.
Game three is 4:15 p.m. March 17 in Airdrie.
If needed, game four is March 18 at 1:30 p.m. in Airdrie and game five is March 21 at 6:45 p.m. at Go Auto Arena.
The winner advances to westerns, March 29 to April 1 at Kamloops.
The last time the Sabres won provincials was 1999.
The Sabres and Xtreme are 7-1 after three playoff series.
The Sabres (44 GF/21 GA) are coming off a three-game sweep of the PAC Saints (18-14-4) in the north conference final.
The Xtreme (36 GF/16 GA) disposed of the No. 1-ranked Calgary Bisons (29-3-4, 154 GF/57 GA) in the south conference final after losing the series opener 5-4 in double overtime. Game two was 3-2 in triple OT, followed by wins of 4-2 Tuesday and 5-2 Wednesday.
The Sabres (25-3-8, 186 GF/58 GA) and Xtreme (25-5-6, 148 GF/72 GA), finished second and third, respectively, in the overall standings and the final marks the first time the teams have faced each other this season.
Ethan Sundar of the Sabres leads all playoff scorers with 16 points, followed by Craig Armstrong and Ty Mueller of the Xtreme with 14 points apiece.
Sundar and Armstrong have nine goals each.
REM 15 playoffs
The St. Albert Royals and Strathcona Warriors face-off Sunday in game three of the best-of-five Rural & Edmonton Midget 15AA Hockey League semifinal.Puck drop is 4 p.m. at Go Auto Arena.
The Royals won the series opener 9-0 Wednesday in St. Albert and Friday’s score from the Strathcona Olympiette Centre was unavailable at press time.
If needed, game four is 8 p.m. Thursday in Strathcona and game five is 8:15 p.m. Thursday at Go Auto Arena.
The winner plays the Hockey Central Panthers (19-4-4) or CAC Volvo (11-15-1) in the best-of-five final.
The Royals (18-7-2, 100 GF/64 GA) placed third and the Warriors (5-21-1, 81 GF/144 GA) finished 10th out of 10 teams in the regular season.
Both teams qualified for the semifinals through their respective five-team round robin pools. The Royals were 4-0 (20 GF/7 GA) and the Warriors were 2-2 (13 GF/17 GA).
The Royals fired 54 shots in game one as Ashton Blais lit the lamp three times and Brett Reiter, Joshua Fesyk (power play), Tyler Letwin, Hayden Carlson, Adam Olsen and Joshua Cyr also scored.
Carlson, the top playoff scorer with eight goals and 13 points, added three assists.
Cole Crozier faced 12 shots while posting team’s second consecutive playoff shutout.
Raiders finished
For the second year in a row, the St. Albert Tire Warehouse Raiders were eliminated by the Leduc Oil Kings in the Alberta Midget Hockey League’s north division semifinals.The best-of-five series ended with Tuesday’s 7-4 decision in game four after last year’s playoff was decided in game five in St. Albert.
The defending AMHL provincial champions polished off the Raiders in the third period with five goals and the fourth was an empty netter to make it 6-4 with 65 seconds remaining.
The Raiders posted period leads of 1-0 after the first on Brady Nicholas’ goal and 3-2 after the second as Xavier Halterman and Zach Carlson found the back of the net.
Eddie Gallagher broke a 3-3 tie at 4:06 of the third.
The Raiders outshot the Oil Kings in every game and Tuesday’s margin was 46-35 with Mitch Reidy (1-2, 4.58 GAA, one shutout) between the pipes for the No. 1 defensive team in the north in the regular season.
The Raiders won the series opener 5-0 in St. Albert and the Oil Kings posted wins of 5-2 on the road and 3-0 at home.
Halterman led the Raiders in scoring with five points in the series and also tallied twice along with Brock Bartholomew.
The Raiders (18-12-5, 97 GF/73 GA) and Leduc (11-16-8, 105 GF/123 GA) finished second and third, respectively, for the second year in a row in the north standings.
The Raiders had first-round byes both years while Oil Kings advanced to the north semifinals with opening playoff series victories.
