Windsor Royals begin play at Atlantic Junior Hockey Championships

The Windsor Royals have begun play at the 2008 Atlantic Junior Hockey Championships on the UPEI campus, Charlottetown.

The final results and play-by-play on how the Royals did in the 2008 Don Johnson Cup Atlantic Final will be in The Hants Journal next week.

Windsor opened against the St. John's Junior Celtics at 12:30 Wednesday afternoon, April 9, and played again Thursday, April 10, this game against the New Brunswick champions the Dieppe-Memramcook Voyageurs. Friday, April 11, the Royals were up against all Prince Edward Island teams as they played the Prince Edward Island Provincial Champs the Kensington Vipers, who defeated the Sherwood-Parkdale Falcons with a win in double overtime in Game 6 of their league championship series before going up against Sherwood-Parkdale at 7:30 Friday evening.

Coach Scott Roles has described the 2007-2008 season as a "rollercoaster", saying "we lost out # 1 goaltender with a leg injury in late November, our top scorer Dylan Shearer with a wrist injury, yet the club stayed together.” Roles said, “we had to play with our # 2 goaltender Adam Bruce for 13 games, and we held our own.”

He said, “we signed Fearneley Jan. 10, and he played great hockey and then was injured early in the East Hants series, but we had our #1A goalie Matt Pongoski, who was finally able to come back and played outstanding until Fearneley came back from his concussion mid-way through the championship series.”

Roles felt Prince Edward Island will be strong, they had been speaking with Newfoundland to find out what can be expected from there but admitted they knew little about the New Brunswick entry.