The Yorkton Kinsmen 鈥楢A鈥� Terriers of the SSMHL Midget Division had their season come to an end last Wednesday, March 4 at the hands of the SSMHL Midget regular season champion Regina Capitals, falling to the Capitals by a score of 6-3 in Game Two at the Farrell Agencies Arena in Yorkton after a 6-0 defeat Monday, March 2 in Regina in Game One.
Regina鈥檚 Carson Denomie, who had 36 goals and 23 assists in 30 games with the SBAAHL鈥檚 Regina Pat Blues before his call-up, opened the scoring with 4:57 remaining in the first period for the only goal of the opening frame.
A pair of Regina goals 2:13 apart in the second period, the first by Tanner McKechnie and the other by Ty Acoose, made it 3-0 for the Capitals, chasing Yorkton goaltender Alex Geddes from the net in favour of Austin Hilderman.
The goaltending change seemed to work momentarily for the Kinsmen Terriers as Yorkton regular season leading scorer Tayon Metzler finally got the Kinsmen Terriers on the board with just over two minutes left in the second period to give the hosts some hope heading into the final 20 minutes.
The Metzler momentum carried over into the third period as he once again struck for Yorkton to bring the host Kinsmen Terriers to within one, however that was as close as Yorkton would get as Brandon Griffiths and Fraiser Belanger made it first 4-2 and then 5-2 for Regina.
Metzler finished off his hattrick via a power play goal with 72 seconds remaining in the game and Mason Mullaney rounded out the scoring by putting the puck into the empty Yorkton net to wrap up a 6-3 Regina win thereby ending the Yorkton Kinsmen Terrier season.
However, the loss, while painful, was not enough in head coach Noel Budz鈥檚 mind, to put a damper on the successful season the Kinsmen Terriers had.鈥滱t the start of year we had three goals: qualify for provincials, qualify for playoffs, and win a championship,鈥� said the Kinsmen Terrier bench boss. 鈥淎s Meatloaf sang, 鈥楾wo out of three ain鈥檛 bad鈥�.
鈥淥verall we鈥檙e proud of the boys. It was a Great group of 17 young men.鈥�
Budz then turned his attention to his team鈥檚 final game, mentioning that his team played well, the fact of the matter was they simply ran into the best team in the league. 鈥淭heir transition is second to none in the league,鈥� offered Budz on his team鈥檚 first round opponent. 鈥淭hey continually found odd man rushes against us and they do not miss on many of those opportunities.鈥�
Budz also felt that, had his team played as well in the second half of the season(they were just 5-9-5) as they had in the first (they went 9-7-3 in the first 19 games), they would have avoided the Capitals in the first round of the playoffs. 鈥淒uring the new year we seemed to struggle more moving the puck quicker in all zones of the rink and hesitations seemed to catch up to us in games,鈥� suggested the Kinsmen Terrier coach, adding that the loss of one player to the Yorkton Maulers also had a significant impact on the team chemistry. 鈥淲e felt a huge loss when Cody Dubas moved up to the Maulers because he is a great puck moving defenceman.鈥�
Next up for the Yorkton Kinsmen Terriers will be their annual awards night. As of yet, a date has not been selected, however the night should be good as the Kinsmen Terriers are coming off of their most successful season since joining the SSMHL Midget Division.
