The St. Albert Steel continued their losing ways last weekend in the Alberta Junior Hockey League.
The Steel (7-42-3) extended their winless streak to nine games in Sunday’s 6-3 loss to the Okotoks Oilers (27-19-5) at Performance Arena. The loss was the 19th in 20 games for the last-place team in the north division.
The Oilers scored three times in the opening five minutes before Ryan Berlin potted the first of his two goals of the game. It was 5-2 for Okotoks when Dallas Smith connected in the third period.
Okotoks outshot the home team 38-31. In net for the Steel was Tanner Kovacs (1-9, 5.37 GAA).
Kovacs was also between the pipes in Saturday’s 5-3 loss to the Grande Prairie Storm (17-30-3) in St. Albert.
Bryce Sauers, Mitch Loose and Jake Rawlins scored as the Steel let the lead slip away three times.
The Storm ended the game with three unanswered goals, sparked by a shorthanded effort to knot it 3-3 halfway through the second.
The shot count was 37-27 for the visitors.
The Steel have eight games left in their season, including Friday’s home game against the Drumheller Dragons (15-34-3) at 7 p.m.
Saturday the Steel travel to Bonnyville to play the Pontiacs (33-13-5) at 7 p.m.
The red-hot St. Albert Flyers soared into a first-place tie in the north conference after a pair of home-ice wins last weekend in the Alberta Minor Midget AAA Hockey League.
The Flyers are undefeated in eight games after beating the Lloydminster Rage 5-2 and the Spruce Grove Saints 4-1 at Akinsdale Arena.
The Flyers (18-5-5) and Rage (18-5-5) share top spot in the standings and are one point ahead of the Saints (18-7-4) in the pennant race.
Brett Smythe led all scorers against the Rage with one goal and three assists. Jake Kohlhauser, Matt Havens, Paul Lovsin and Brett Van Os also scored and Pat Gora stopped 32 shots.
Lovsin, Havens, Van Os and Guy Butlin lit the lamp against the Saints and Gora was credited with 28 saves.
Lovsin is the conference scoring leader with 29 goals and 52 points in 27 games.
Gora (10-2-3) leads all goalies with a 1.96 GAA and .929 save percentage.
Saturday the Flyers host the Camrose Vikings (2-21-4) at 1:15 p.m. at Akinsdale Arena. Sunday they play the SSAC Bulldogs (15-8-3) at 6:40 p.m. at Callingwood Arena.
The St. Albert Slash rallied from a four-goal, first-period deficit to tie the Edmonton Thunder 4-4 Saturday in the Alberta Major Midget Female Hockey League.
The Thunder tallied twice at even strength, scored once on the power play and struck while shorthanded in the opening period at Performance Arena.
Charity Price, Ashley Morin and Lindsay Cox replied for the Slash in the second and Denzelle Bourgeois notched the equalizer with 7:15 remaining in the game.
Slash netminder Emily Mitchell let in three goals on four shots in 12:45 minutes of work. Her replacement, Kaelin Klim, gave up one goal on 25 shots. Chloe Sanderson of the Thunder faced 16 shots.
Sunday at home against the Sherwood Park Fury (5-21-2), Morin and Jessica Kampjes potted a pair each and Sabrina Flemming also scored in the 5-1 win. Shots were 40-16 for the Slash. In net was Klim.
In the north standings the Slash (17-6-5) trail the Thunder (21-3-3) by six points, but the defending league champions and 2011 Esso Cup national silver medallists from Edmonton have a game in hand.
The last home games for the Slash before the playoffs are against the Red Deer Chiefs (29-6-2) Saturday at 2:15 p.m. and the Calgary Flyers (15-11-2) Sunday at 2 p.m.
The Slash wrap up league play next weekend on the road against the Calgary Bruins (12-10-5) and Highwood Raiders (3-20-5).
Nine teams from St. Albert celebrated gold-medal victories in the recent Edmonton Minor Hockey Week tournament.
The playoff winners were the novice Rage (Ferguson tier), atom female Blue Devils (Avalanche tier), atom Storm (Oilers tier), peewee A Blades (Dutchak tier), peewee Edge (Sanregret tier), peewee Battalion (Shave tier), peewee Bruins (Sollanych tier), bantam Rangers (Fysh tier) and the bantam Hawks (Ross tier).
The St. Albert Minor Hockey Association was represented by 63 teams in the 49th annual tournament. Overall, 518 teams competed in 72 tiers in the novice, atom, peewee, bantam, midget and female divisions.
