It came down to a single goal that eliminated King’s-Edgehill School from the playoff round at the 2013 Birthplace of Hockey high school boys hockey tournament this past weekend.
Held at the Hants Exhibition Arena in Windsor, play started Thursday evening, Nov. 14, continued for 12 hours on Friday, another eight hours on Saturday before the championship game Sunday afternoon, Nov. 17.
The championship game featured a re-match of Friday night's game between Halifax West and Moncton.
King’s-Edgehill, St. John’s Ravencourt, from Manitoba, and Dartmouth High all finished with 2-1 records in the "A" Division while the Avon View Avalanche failed to win a game, finishing at 0-3.
The only chance KES had of going to the playoffs was if Avon View had defeated the Manitoba high school team on Saturday morning.
As a result, the first tie-breaking mechanism was used which stated that if three or more teams were tied after round-robin play, the tie would be broken with the teams having the highest ratio for goals scored divided by goals against.
This mathematical formula would only be used in games played between KES, Manitoba and Dartmouth. The AVHS games did not count.
As a result, Manitoba, who scored five goals and allowed four, finished with a ratio of 1.25 while Dartmouth, who scored five and allowed five, ended with a ratio of 1.0. KES scored six goals but allowed seven, which meant they finished with a ratio of 0.85.
The Halifax West Warriors made it much easier for tournament organizers in the "B" Division as they were the only one of eight teams to finish at 3-0. Finishing second was Moncton at 2-1, Memorial, from North Sydney, at 1-2 and Eastern Shore, at 0-3.
The following is a recap of four days of high school hockey action in Windsor.
Tournament opens with overtime win
The Dartmouth High Spartans defeated St. John’s Ravencourt, from Manitoba, 2-1 in overtime.
St. John’s dominated this game but the Dartmouth goaltending was sensational. The Manitoba-based school outshot Dartmouth 31-11. The Spartans goaltender, an exchange student, is a member of Lithuania's national Under 18 hockey team.
KES downs Avon View 7-2
It is only when a Junior B or Junior C team advances deep into the playoffs, or when there is a rivalry between the local high school hockey teams, that anyone can expect the parking lot at Hants Exhibition Arena to be overflowing.
Such was the case Thursday evening, Nov. 14 when King’s-Edgehill School and Avon View faced off.
The game started an hour late due to problems experienced with Windsor's new Zamboni machine. The problem could not be corrected, forcing rink officials to use the former ice-cleaning machine. It was a machine arena staff thought they had retired after 20 years.
The Avalanche struggled immensely in the opening period to clear the puck from their own end and ended up losing by a score of 7-2.
Avalanche goaltender Alex Williams started the game strong for the Avalanche but couldn’t hold onto the momentum.
Isaac Bridge opened the scoring for KES with a hard wrist shot after Avon View diligently worked to clear the puck from their end in the opening five minutes of the first period. Jabes Benedict rifled a hard wrist shot for a 2-0 lead.
KES kept the pressure on and staked themselves to a 4-0 lead with goals by Karl-Eric Demers and Robert Burrows. With 11 seconds to play in the opening period, Tommy Delorme was credited for putting KES in front 5-0.
Early in the second period, the tournament hosts found themselves short-handed for four minutes and with 2:10 left on the Avalanche power-play, Avon View thought they had scored their first goal of the game, only to have to it nullified by the referee.
With the score still 5-0, and 37 seconds remaining on another Avon View power-play, team captain Trevor House scored. Cory Whitney then helped make the score 5-2. Jared Weatherbee then scored for KES, making the score 6-2.
Avon View’s comeback was short-lived as KES tallied one more goal in the third period to win 7-2. The final goal scorer was Neil MacQuarrie.
KES edges Dartmouth 4-3
King’s-Edgehill School and the Dartmouth High Spartans were the first to play Friday morning, with the host team winning the match.
KES opened the scoring on a goal by Michael Jachimowicz before Dartmouth tied it up. KES outshot Dartmouth 15-8 in the opening period.
Isaac Bridge connected on a wrist shot from 20 feet out as he was coming down the left side of the Dartmouth net to make it 2-1. Tommy Delorme then scored for KES to put the host school up 3-1 in the second period. Dartmouth scored in the third to close the gap to 3-2 before Delorme scored his second of the game to make it 4-2. Dartmouth tallied another and tried to tie it up but they couldn’t and lost 4-3.
KES held a 33-27 shots advantage.
Halifax West defeats Eastern Shore 3-1
The Halifax West Warriors fell behind 1-0 after the opening period before scoring a pair in the second period and one more in the third to defeat Eastern Shore 3-1.
One point to note is that one of the Warriors’ top defencemen, Ryan Swinamer, has several Hants West roots. Swinamer’s parents both graduated from the former Windsor Regional High School and both sets of grandparents still reside in the area — Florence and Weldon Swinamer in Upper Vaughans and Lawrence and Janet Boyd in Three Mile Plains.
Moncton downs Memorial 3-1
In the next game of the tournament, the Moncton Knights defeated the Memorial High Marauders 3-1.
Dartmouth doubles AVHS 6-3
The Avalanche had Dartmouth on the run in the opening 10 minutes of the game but the momentum shifted and the Spartans took the lead, going on to win it 6-3.
Dartmouth scored goals 10 seconds apart to go up 2-0 before Ben Davidson made it 2-1 and Jake Lloy, grabbing a rebound 27 seconds later, tied the game at 2-2. It was a culmination of three goals in 37 seconds.
Avon View was then given a gift of a four-minute power-play but they played as if they were short-handed and couldn’t capitalize on the opportunity. Cory Whitney then took a hooking penalty to kill the power-play with 2:20 left in it.
Dartmouth went in front 3-2 with 6:27 gone in the second period on a wrist shot that Avalanche goaltender Alex Williams appeared to be screened on.
Dartmouth scored with 54 seconds left in the second to go up 4-2. Dartmouth and Avon View traded goals 21 seconds apart in the third period as Davidson scored his second of the game on a rebound from a shot by Trevor House.
Dartmouth added one more goal to double AVHS 6-3.
St. John’s Ravencourt downs KES 4-2
King’s-Edgehill and St. John’s Ravencourt entered the third period of this game tied at 2-2. A win by KES would have automatically put them into the semi-finals but such was not to be. The Manitoba-based school scored twice in the third to win the game 4-2.
Memorial edges Eastern Shore 4-3
This game was tied 3-3 with five minutes to play in regulation when Memorial was awarded a penalty shot, which they took advantage of and won the game against Eastern Shore.
Halifax West doubles Moncton 4-2
All that needs to be said about this game between the Halifax West Warriors and the Moncton Knights is that it was fantastic, with both teams playing aggressively and both teams knowing what was at stake in the round-robin standings.
Moncton defeats Eastern Shore 5-1
The Moncton Knights clinched a play-off berth with this victory over the Eastern Shore Schooners.
St. John’s Ravencourt trounces AVHS 7-1
With a win against St. John’s Ravencourt, Avon View could have eliminated the team from the playoffs and put King’s-Edgehill School in. However, Manitoba went up 3-0 before the game was even five minutes old.
Avon View was outplayed in the opening period, being outshot 21-4.
Trevor House tallied the Avalanche's lone marker in their 7-1 loss.
Halifax West wins 5-2 over Memorial
This was a unique game on two fronts in the tournament. A win by Halifax West would make them the only undefeated team of the tournament, while a loss by Halifax would have put them into a three-way tie with Memorial and Moncton.
Halifax West jumped out in front 3-0 before the Memorial High Marauders stormed back with a pair of goals 22 seconds apart. Unfortunately for them, it would be their only two goals of the game.
The Halifax West Warriors won the match 5-2.
Semi-final game 1
The Moncton Knights took advantage of their opportunities against a seemingly sluggish Manitoba team in their semi-final game Nov. 16.
The New Brunswick school took an early 1-0 lead and upped their margin with a pair of goals in the second for a 3-0 final, despite only outshooting St. John’s Ravencourt 22-21.
Semi-final game 2
The Halifax West Warriors took on the Dartmouth High Spartans during the second semi-final game Nov. 16.
The teams were scoreless after the first period but Halifax had Dartmouth on the run for the majority of the second period. Halifax missed three exceptional scoring opportunities before finally scoring the game's first goal on a beautiful two-way passing play with 4:56 left in the second period.
The final was 3-0 for the Warriors, allowing them to advance to the championship final.
Championship game
The Halifax West Warriors entered the Nov. 17 championship game with a 4-0 record but Moncton appeared to be at the ready as the Warriors struggled in the opening frame, encountering difficulty in their own end.
The teams were scoreless after one period, even though the Moncton Knights outshot Halifax 10-1. In the second period, Halifax West regained whatever momentum they lost in the first period. The Warriors took a 1-0 lead with 5:08 to play in the middle period. With 39 seconds left in the second, Ryan Swinamer and Claude Moulaison set up Halifax's second goal of the game.
With 46 seconds left in the game, Moulaison and Swinamer set up the West's final goal into an empty net for a 3-0 Halifax win.
The Halifax team was crowned the 22nd annual Birthplace of Hockey high school tournament champions.
It marked their first time winning the tournament.
Tournament facts
King’s-Edgehill School has won the tournament seven times out of the 22 years it has been played.
St. Johns Ravencourt, from Manitoba, has won on three separate occasions.
Avon View has one tournament win, and that came in 2005.
It came down to a single goal that eliminated King’s-Edgehill School from the playoff round at the 2013 Birthplace of Hockey high school boys hockey tournament this past weekend.
Held at the Hants Exhibition Arena in Windsor, play started Thursday evening, Nov. 14, continued for 12 hours on Friday, another eight hours on Saturday before the championship game Sunday afternoon, Nov. 17.
The championship game featured a re-match of Friday night's game between Halifax West and Moncton.
King’s-Edgehill, St. John’s Ravencourt, from Manitoba, and Dartmouth High all finished with 2-1 records in the "A" Division while the Avon View Avalanche failed to win a game, finishing at 0-3.
The only chance KES had of going to the playoffs was if Avon View had defeated the Manitoba high school team on Saturday morning.
As a result, the first tie-breaking mechanism was used which stated that if three or more teams were tied after round-robin play, the tie would be broken with the teams having the highest ratio for goals scored divided by goals against.
This mathematical formula would only be used in games played between KES, Manitoba and Dartmouth. The AVHS games did not count.
As a result, Manitoba, who scored five goals and allowed four, finished with a ratio of 1.25 while Dartmouth, who scored five and allowed five, ended with a ratio of 1.0. KES scored six goals but allowed seven, which meant they finished with a ratio of 0.85.
The Halifax West Warriors made it much easier for tournament organizers in the "B" Division as they were the only one of eight teams to finish at 3-0. Finishing second was Moncton at 2-1, Memorial, from North Sydney, at 1-2 and Eastern Shore, at 0-3.
The following is a recap of four days of high school hockey action in Windsor.
Tournament opens with overtime win
The Dartmouth High Spartans defeated St. John’s Ravencourt, from Manitoba, 2-1 in overtime.
St. John’s dominated this game but the Dartmouth goaltending was sensational. The Manitoba-based school outshot Dartmouth 31-11. The Spartans goaltender, an exchange student, is a member of Lithuania's national Under 18 hockey team.
KES downs Avon View 7-2
It is only when a Junior B or Junior C team advances deep into the playoffs, or when there is a rivalry between the local high school hockey teams, that anyone can expect the parking lot at Hants Exhibition Arena to be overflowing.
Such was the case Thursday evening, Nov. 14 when King’s-Edgehill School and Avon View faced off.
The game started an hour late due to problems experienced with Windsor's new Zamboni machine. The problem could not be corrected, forcing rink officials to use the former ice-cleaning machine. It was a machine arena staff thought they had retired after 20 years.
The Avalanche struggled immensely in the opening period to clear the puck from their own end and ended up losing by a score of 7-2.
Avalanche goaltender Alex Williams started the game strong for the Avalanche but couldn’t hold onto the momentum.
Isaac Bridge opened the scoring for KES with a hard wrist shot after Avon View diligently worked to clear the puck from their end in the opening five minutes of the first period. Jabes Benedict rifled a hard wrist shot for a 2-0 lead.
KES kept the pressure on and staked themselves to a 4-0 lead with goals by Karl-Eric Demers and Robert Burrows. With 11 seconds to play in the opening period, Tommy Delorme was credited for putting KES in front 5-0.
Early in the second period, the tournament hosts found themselves short-handed for four minutes and with 2:10 left on the Avalanche power-play, Avon View thought they had scored their first goal of the game, only to have to it nullified by the referee.
With the score still 5-0, and 37 seconds remaining on another Avon View power-play, team captain Trevor House scored. Cory Whitney then helped make the score 5-2. Jared Weatherbee then scored for KES, making the score 6-2.
Avon View’s comeback was short-lived as KES tallied one more goal in the third period to win 7-2. The final goal scorer was Neil MacQuarrie.
KES edges Dartmouth 4-3
King’s-Edgehill School and the Dartmouth High Spartans were the first to play Friday morning, with the host team winning the match.
KES opened the scoring on a goal by Michael Jachimowicz before Dartmouth tied it up. KES outshot Dartmouth 15-8 in the opening period.
Isaac Bridge connected on a wrist shot from 20 feet out as he was coming down the left side of the Dartmouth net to make it 2-1. Tommy Delorme then scored for KES to put the host school up 3-1 in the second period. Dartmouth scored in the third to close the gap to 3-2 before Delorme scored his second of the game to make it 4-2. Dartmouth tallied another and tried to tie it up but they couldn’t and lost 4-3.
KES held a 33-27 shots advantage.
Halifax West defeats Eastern Shore 3-1
The Halifax West Warriors fell behind 1-0 after the opening period before scoring a pair in the second period and one more in the third to defeat Eastern Shore 3-1.
One point to note is that one of the Warriors’ top defencemen, Ryan Swinamer, has several Hants West roots. Swinamer’s parents both graduated from the former Windsor Regional High School and both sets of grandparents still reside in the area — Florence and Weldon Swinamer in Upper Vaughans and Lawrence and Janet Boyd in Three Mile Plains.
Moncton downs Memorial 3-1
In the next game of the tournament, the Moncton Knights defeated the Memorial High Marauders 3-1.
Dartmouth doubles AVHS 6-3
The Avalanche had Dartmouth on the run in the opening 10 minutes of the game but the momentum shifted and the Spartans took the lead, going on to win it 6-3.
Dartmouth scored goals 10 seconds apart to go up 2-0 before Ben Davidson made it 2-1 and Jake Lloy, grabbing a rebound 27 seconds later, tied the game at 2-2. It was a culmination of three goals in 37 seconds.
Avon View was then given a gift of a four-minute power-play but they played as if they were short-handed and couldn’t capitalize on the opportunity. Cory Whitney then took a hooking penalty to kill the power-play with 2:20 left in it.
Dartmouth went in front 3-2 with 6:27 gone in the second period on a wrist shot that Avalanche goaltender Alex Williams appeared to be screened on.
Dartmouth scored with 54 seconds left in the second to go up 4-2. Dartmouth and Avon View traded goals 21 seconds apart in the third period as Davidson scored his second of the game on a rebound from a shot by Trevor House.
Dartmouth added one more goal to double AVHS 6-3.
St. John’s Ravencourt downs KES 4-2
King’s-Edgehill and St. John’s Ravencourt entered the third period of this game tied at 2-2. A win by KES would have automatically put them into the semi-finals but such was not to be. The Manitoba-based school scored twice in the third to win the game 4-2.
Memorial edges Eastern Shore 4-3
This game was tied 3-3 with five minutes to play in regulation when Memorial was awarded a penalty shot, which they took advantage of and won the game against Eastern Shore.
Halifax West doubles Moncton 4-2
All that needs to be said about this game between the Halifax West Warriors and the Moncton Knights is that it was fantastic, with both teams playing aggressively and both teams knowing what was at stake in the round-robin standings.
Moncton defeats Eastern Shore 5-1
The Moncton Knights clinched a play-off berth with this victory over the Eastern Shore Schooners.
St. John’s Ravencourt trounces AVHS 7-1
With a win against St. John’s Ravencourt, Avon View could have eliminated the team from the playoffs and put King’s-Edgehill School in. However, Manitoba went up 3-0 before the game was even five minutes old.
Avon View was outplayed in the opening period, being outshot 21-4.
Trevor House tallied the Avalanche's lone marker in their 7-1 loss.
Halifax West wins 5-2 over Memorial
This was a unique game on two fronts in the tournament. A win by Halifax West would make them the only undefeated team of the tournament, while a loss by Halifax would have put them into a three-way tie with Memorial and Moncton.
Halifax West jumped out in front 3-0 before the Memorial High Marauders stormed back with a pair of goals 22 seconds apart. Unfortunately for them, it would be their only two goals of the game.
The Halifax West Warriors won the match 5-2.
Semi-final game 1
The Moncton Knights took advantage of their opportunities against a seemingly sluggish Manitoba team in their semi-final game Nov. 16.
The New Brunswick school took an early 1-0 lead and upped their margin with a pair of goals in the second for a 3-0 final, despite only outshooting St. John’s Ravencourt 22-21.
Semi-final game 2
The Halifax West Warriors took on the Dartmouth High Spartans during the second semi-final game Nov. 16.
The teams were scoreless after the first period but Halifax had Dartmouth on the run for the majority of the second period. Halifax missed three exceptional scoring opportunities before finally scoring the game's first goal on a beautiful two-way passing play with 4:56 left in the second period.
The final was 3-0 for the Warriors, allowing them to advance to the championship final.
Championship game
The Halifax West Warriors entered the Nov. 17 championship game with a 4-0 record but Moncton appeared to be at the ready as the Warriors struggled in the opening frame, encountering difficulty in their own end.
The teams were scoreless after one period, even though the Moncton Knights outshot Halifax 10-1. In the second period, Halifax West regained whatever momentum they lost in the first period. The Warriors took a 1-0 lead with 5:08 to play in the middle period. With 39 seconds left in the second, Ryan Swinamer and Claude Moulaison set up Halifax's second goal of the game.
With 46 seconds left in the game, Moulaison and Swinamer set up the West's final goal into an empty net for a 3-0 Halifax win.
The Halifax team was crowned the 22nd annual Birthplace of Hockey high school tournament champions.
It marked their first time winning the tournament.
Tournament facts
King’s-Edgehill School has won the tournament seven times out of the 22 years it has been played.
St. Johns Ravencourt, from Manitoba, has won on three separate occasions.
Avon View has one tournament win, and that came in 2005.
