The
midget minor stars travelled to Etobicoke this past weekend to compete in the
West Mall Lightning Earlybird Tournament.
In a season with high expectations, the Stars were anxious to see what
they had. This 10 team tournament was
comprised of some of the top teams in the GTHL and MHL; including last year’s
OHF Champion, Port Credit Storm.
The Stars, not intimidated by the GTA, began their journey to the finals by dismantling the host West Mall Lightning 6-0 in game one Friday night. Josh Rice led the way for the stars with 2 goals on the night, while Jack Langlois posted his first shutout of the season. Moving into Saturday morning’s game, the Stars came out flat and over confident. Battling all the way to the end, the Stars skated to a 1-1 draw with Meadowvale Mohawks. Garret Blunt was the lone goal scorer for the Stars. Shaking off their early morning effort, the Stars came out flying in their final round robin game against Cooksville Phantoms. Cam Aucoin’s highlight reel goal helped push the stars to a dominating 5-1 victory.
The Stars were into the semi-finals and set to face a West Hill Golden Hawks team that went 3-0 in the round robin and had yet to surrender a goal. Amherstburg - wanting to make their 6th consecutive tournament final - came out on top with scoring from Justin Veldhuis and Jarrod Benninger. That would be all the Stars needed, coupled with a great shutout performance from DJ Hall. The finals went the Stars way in every aspect of the game, starting with a Garret Blunt shot from the red line going in a mere 16 seconds into the game. From there, the Stars didn’t look back skating to a 7-1 stomping of the Amesbury Attack. Nick Bertram led the way with 2 goals in the contest. The stars finished the weekend posting 21 goals for and only 3 goals against.
“All we did was lay a good foundation for a great season,” said head coach Paul Bortignon. “As a team we know what our ultimate goal is and this weekend was the first step in the right direction.” Captain Garret Blunt added.
The Stars open up their Bluewater League campaign this Friday night at 8:40pm versus the Erie North Shore Storm at UCCUC.