Wildcats roar into Digby

By Jonathan Riley

DIGBY COURIER

NovaNewsNow.com

The Valley Wildcats treated Digby hockey fans to some truly exciting major midget action this week.

With no ice-time available anywhere in the Valley, Lindsay Horne, the Wildcats head coach and general manager decided to host the Halifax MacDonalds in Digby, Wednesday night, Feb. 7.

“To be honest, if the geography was better, I’d love to play here,” said Horne Wednesday night. “It’s a great facility, they keep it in top-notch shape and the people here have been fantastic to work with.

“The game seemed well-received and there’s a decent crowd here considering the weather. This would be one of our top five crowds this year.”

Many of the fans came to see Digby’s own Andrew Walker play a rare game at home.

“It’s been four years since I played at home,” says Walker. “I loved playing in front of my family and friends and just showing them what I’m doing with hockey.”

The 6’0’’, 178 pound defenceman has played 35 games with the Wildcats this year and now has two goals and five assists. He played only nine games last year with the Wildcats and had one assist.

The MacDonalds beat the Wildcats three-two despite trailing one-nothing for 19 minutes of the first, and two-nothing for 15 minutes of the second.

Shots on goal were 39-21 for the MacDonalds.

Walker helped out with an assist on Jay Titchmarsh’s second goal of the game early in the second period.

“I just shot the puck on net,” said Walker. “That’s what Lindsay wants us to do, put the pucks on net and then pound away down low, and the puck went in.”

Luke Short started the scoring for Halifax. Ryan Fortune and Spencer Cameron finished it in the third.

“We haven’t played a lot with a lead this year,” says Horne. “We came out a little tentative in the third. We tried to protect for 20 minutes instead of continuing to play the way we had earlier. We just didn’t get the job done.”

In his players’ defence, Horne pointed out that they have just wrapped up four games in five days.

“One of the things that gets lost here, is we just played Cape Breton West at 8 p.m. last night.

“A lot of the guys didn’t get home until 5 a.m. and then they drove up here in all this weather.

“I’m pretty pleased with the way we played the last two nights – we played decent playoff hockey.

“If we continue like that and just shore up a few little things, we’ll have some success in our series against Dartmouth.”

The Wildcats begin a best of five series against Dartmouth this Saturday, Feb. 9 at the Sportsplex.

The earliest that series could wrap up is Feb. 16 in Kentville. That would free up Andrew Walker, Andrew Maxwell and Blake Hayes to play as affiliates with the Valley Keith’s who start playoffs after their last regular season game Feb. 10.