At the beginning of his first season as head coach of the St. Albert Raiders’ bantam female hockey team, Kevin Emes believed the team would be competitive.
A few months later, the lady Raiders have proven they are a threat on the ice as they head into the Christmas break in first place in the Alberta Major Bantam Female Hockey League’s north division.
Emes says the team achieved its goal of ending the year at the top of the division, but the season is far from finished.
“We’re not where we need to be yet, but I think the girls are working really hard. It’s just a matter of finding consistency and bringing it every game,” Emes says. “We’ve had some struggles in our own division with Edmonton (5-12-1) and Sherwood Park (7-7-3), although we beat (Sherwood Park) on Sunday (3-1). They are really good teams within our division, and we haven’t had a lot of exposure to the south (division) yet.”
St. Albert (9-5-1) is currently the top defensive team in the north with 27 goals against, just one more than the Rocky Mountain Raiders (15-0). The defending provincial champions currently lead the south division.
“Our defensive game is probably a little stronger than our offensive game,” Emes says. “We haven’t had many games where we’ve allowed three goals or more. We’ve had a couple, but other than that we’re limiting a lot of the teams to two or three goals or less, so that’s where we want to be.”
Talent in the net is definitely helping St. Albert’s defensive game. Hannah Clark (5-1-1, 1.43 GAA) is the league’s No. 1 ranked netminder.
Natalie Bender (4-4-0, 2.13 GAA) is the team’s other goalie.
“In general, both of our goaltenders are very strong. Hannah has had some games where she’s been stellar,” Emes says. “Like any goaltending on any team, there are days when we struggle a little, but for the most part Hannah and Natalie both have been able to reel it in and claw back. Sometimes we lose by one goal, sometimes we win by one goal, and our goaltending is definitely one of the things that makes us a strong contender.”
Offensively, the Raiders have a couple of lines that are scoring pretty well. Jaime Kidd is having a good season, as is Jamie Jones. Kidd and Jones are tied for ninth in the league for points with 13.
“They’re both really strong players. They read the ice well,” Emes says. “For both of them, it’s a matter of being consistent and bringing their A game every game. This is a league where you can’t take a night off, you can’t take a shift off.”
The team is on a break from competition until early January, but the ladies will be practicing hard. The coaching staff is looking at changing up the breakouts, working on the forecheck and strengthening the special teams.
“We’re throwing some new things at the girls that they’ll be able to put in their toolbox to improve their game,” Emes says. “We have high hopes for the girls after Christmas.”
Emes says the team is always striving to improve and that will continue in the new year as the competition gets tougher.
“The second half of the season is really going to be the measure for us, facing a lot stronger teams. The south is a strong division,” Emes says. “We’re kind of going on our southern swing here after Christmas, but that being said, we seem to perform better against the better teams.”
St. Albert tested its mettle against midget AA and bantam AA teams at a tournament in Regina at the end of November and Emes says the ladies were pretty successful.
“The girls put together four really strong games, so we just need to find that consistency game in and game out,” Emes says. “And it’s a struggle. These kids have a lot of things going on in their lives, but when they come to the rink they’ve got to be ready to play.”
The Raiders are back in action Jan. 6 against the Red Deer Chiefs (10-4-2) at 1:30 p.m. at Northstar Hyundai Arena.
