Raiders at home
The St. Albert Tire Warehouse Raiders close out the regular season Sunday at Akinsdale Arena.Faceoff is 12:15 p.m. against the Calgary Northstars in the Alberta Midget AAA Hockey League and the Raiders are 8-6-3 in St. Albert.
The Raiders (17-12-5) are second in the north and the Northstars (22-8-3) are third in the south.
The Raiders and the first-place KC Pats (20-10-3) have first-round byes for berths in the best-of-five north division semifinals.
Last year’s Raiders placed second in the standings at 16-14-4 and lost the semifinal series in five games to the Leduc Oil Kings.
Leduc (10-16-7), the defending AMHL provincial champion, Sherwood Park Kings (11-18-5) and Fort Saskatchewan Rangers (11-19-3) are potential semifinal opponents for the Raiders, winners of four in a row after three consecutive shutout losses.
Midget AA games
The Blues and Source for Sports Crusaders have a slate of upcoming games scheduled in the Northern Alberta Midget AA Hockey League.The Blues and Lloydminster Blazers (3-21-4) face-off at 1:30 p.m. Sunday at Confederation Arena and Tuesday’s contest against the Strathcona Warriors (13-9-4) starts at 8:30 p.m. at Mark Messier Arena.
The Blues (14-6-5), undefeated in six games at 4-0-2, are third in the Anderson division.
The Crusaders travel to play the Sherwood Park Oilers (12-11-4) tonight at 8:45 p.m. and the Camrose Vikings (13-10-3) Sunday at 3:15 p.m.
The Crusaders (17-7-2) are second in the Besa division and in the last three games have lost twice.
League play ends March 4 and the Anderson and Besa divisional playoff tournaments are expected to begin March 6. The division winners advance to the best-of-three Metro conference series.
The Crusaders lost last year’s best-of-five NAMHL final to Strathcona in three games.
SAPEC hoops
The seventh and last week of league play in St. Albert Physical Education Council junior high basketball tips off Tuesday.The opening playoff round is Feb. 27-28 and the semifinals are March 6.
The Tier I city finals are March 8 at the SkyDome.
The defending champions are the Richard S. Fowler Falcons for the girls and Lorne Akins Gators for the boys.
Fowler is undefeated in the eight-team girls’ and nine-team boys’ divisions.
