Eagles season comes to an end

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The Canmore Eagles 25th season has come to a close. But it certainly did not end without a battle as the Eagles who were facing elimination from Game 6 of their 1st Round Best-of-7 series against the evenly matched Camrose Kodiaks were able to force a decisive Game 7 after winning Game 6 on Monday, March 9 by a score of 3-2 in front of 594 fans at the Canmore Recreation Centre.

“I thought we played really well,” said Eagles Head Coach and General Manager Andrew Milne. “Obviously, we were disciplined tonight. That was a big part of what we were trying to work on, we stayed out of the penalty box. For us, it was a good opportunity to be successful when you do that. And obviously, our Power Play was real good. That was something that we needed to have happened for our Power Play to get a little confidence. They’ve been having a lot of chances, but they’ve been a little snake bit, so it was nice to see them get opportunities to score and put us in a position to win the game.”

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It was the Kodiaks who struck first on a Power Play goal from Griffen Fraser at 5:01. The Eagles answered back to tie the game at 12:11 on a nice goal from Defenceman Drae Gardiner. Michael Spafford and Lukas Jirousek assisted.

In the 2nd period, the Eagles regained the lead on a goal from Jarret Timmerman at 5:21. But the Kodiaks took some undisciplined penalties in the middle of the frame and the Eagles were able to make them pay. At 9:30, Lane Paddison cashed in on a rebound for his 2nd of the Playoffs. Alex Young and Jirousek assisted. Then at 10:29, the Eagles got another Power Play goal, this time from Michael Spafford as he tipped in a point shot from Cale Lyons for his 2nd of the Playoffs. Young also got an assist.

There were no goals in the 3rd period. The Eagles had some good chances to extend their lead, but Kodiaks netminder Griffin Bowerman stood tall and finished the night with 44 saves. At the other end, Eagles netminder Kadin Kilpatrick wasn’t as busy as his counterpart, but he was good when called upon and he stopped 24 of the 26 shots he faced to improve his playoffs record to 2-1.

The decisive Game 7 was played at the Camrose Rec Centre on Wednesday night (March 11). The game certainly did not go the way the Eagles would have liked as the Eagles lost the game by a score of 8-2 to see their 2019-20 season come to an end.

“I think that tonight was not our night,” said Eagles Head Coach and General Manager Andrew Milne. “We were fighting the puck in a lot of areas, we weren’t as strong as we could be. We bobbled too many pucks and I think whether that was emotion, butterflies, whatever it was, we fought the puck. It started in the 1st and it didn’t stop. We ended up fighting all night.”

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The Kodiaks scored most of their goals off Eagles turnovers and a few goals that starting Kadin Kilpatrick wished he could have back. They also scored 3 Power Play goals in the 3rd period as the Eagles were showing their frustrating by taking undisciplined penalties down 5-1 after the 2nd period.

Zach Carlson and Tristan Zandee scored for the Eagles, both goals were on the Power Play.

Between the pipes, Kadin Kilpatrick got the start and he made 18 saves. The final shots on goal were 35-26 in favour of the Eagles.

Game 7 certainly did not tell the tale of the rest of the series. The first 6 games were close games and with a few that could have gone either way. When asking Coach Milne what made the difference in the series, he answered saying, “I think it’s hard to put a finger on it. You’ve got to give their goaltender (Griffin Bowerman) a lot of credit. I think he was real good. He played really well in every game and gave them a chance to win every night. He was good and we had a tough time with him. I thought tonight he started the game real well and made some big saves in that 1st period, that could have changed the outcome of the game. He was good and at the end of the day, you get a Game 7 and they were fortunate to win it.”

Despite not being able to advance to Round 2, Coach Milne praised his group for their overall effort in the entire series, saying, “For us to fight to where we got to in this series was outstanding. Our guys battled hard every night, they put themselves in a good position. You know we had some situations where we could have bailed out and we didn’t. We battled back and put ourselves in Game 7 situation, played Game 7 and could go either way and tonight wasn’t our night. We didn’t have anywhere near the puck luck we would have liked and the opportunities found us all night and we ended up with a loss.”

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The game marked the end of the Junior career for 4 Eagles players. 20-year-old Forwards Connor Lyons, Owen Reith and Defenceman Jared Bowman will graduate due to age, along with 18-year-old Forward Alex Young who will be moving on to play NCAA Hockey at Colgate University in the fall.

Bowman who just completed a 4-year career in the Alberta Junior Hockey League splitting his time with Olds Grizzlys and the Eagles, playing 2 seasons with each club spoke after the game saying, “It’s been a hell of a journey. I met a lot of great friends, some great coaches along the way. But the biggest thing is all the memories I’ll have that will last a lifetime. I’ll cherish those forever, that’s for sure.”

In his 4 seasons in the AJHL, Bowman appeared in 218 regular-season games and 22 playoff games. When asked about some of his favourite memories of his Junior career, he mentioned the Eagles exciting playoff run last year and this season’s winning streak that included back-to-back wins over the Brooks Bandits and a win over the Okotoks Oilers.

“We wish them all the best,” said Coach Milne about his 4 graduating players. “I thought again, those were the guys we needed to be good and the way they played, it was a good series for those guys”.