The 100 Mile House Bantam Royals won silver at a tournament in Kelowna, after losing 3-1 to the Cowichan Valley Bantam Capitals.
“This is the second year this team has played together, and we have a number of new players that are still in their first and second years of playing hockey. Our team entered this tournament in Kelowna last year and didn’t win one game, so it is a huge improvement to make it to the finals,” said Denise Balbirnie, the team’s manager.
Vanessa Betschart was the only scorer for 100 Mile House.
In the process of getting to the final, 100 Mile were undefeated in round robin play.
The recreational female bantam team started off the tournament beating Cowichan Valley 5-1.
“They were actually a really strong team. The score doesn’t reflect how even the teams were. We were leading 3-1 for a long time, then our #16 [Dana Quintal] took a penalty with 5:41 left and Cowichan pulled their goalie, so they were up [on a] six on four [powerplay],” said Balbirnie. “There was lots of pressure in our end. Cowichan had some good chances - lots of scrambling from both teams - but we managed to hold them off.”
Cowichan Valley was unable to capitalize on the powerplay due to some key saves from Sarah Balbirnie. With a little of the pressure off and now playing six on five hockey (Cowichan’s goalie still pulled), Megan Holyk of the Royals scored an open netter. After that, Emily Tinney made it 5-1 after the opposition’s goalie returned to play.
Sarah, one of the two daughters of Balbirnie and team coach, Wade Balbirnie, managed to get a shutout in the next game against Ridge Meadows. The score was 5-0, with Betschart getting a hat trick. Tinney got her second goal of the tournament, and the other Balbirnie daughter, Megan, scored a goal as well. Mikayla Glen got two assists.
Betschart scored another hat trick in the third game of round robin play, starting her spree with 22 seconds on the clock of the third period against Kelowna 1.
“We were scoreless in the first and Kelowna went up 2-0 in the second. Sarah Balbirnie was really strong in the net as Kelowna was outshooting us. Vanessa Betschart started the third on fire,” said Balbirnie. “The whole team tightened up their play in the third period.”
The Royals would go on to win 3-2.
The team advanced to the semi-final after an undefeated run in the round robin. They were seeded against the Surrey Falcons.
It was the highest scoring game of the tournament for 100 Mile, with the Royals notching nine goals against Surrey’s four. The second period ended at 4-3 for the Royals.
“We scored first in the third with an end to end rush by Megan Balbirnie, but Surrey answered back a couple of minutes later to keep it a one-goal game. Megan Balbinie scored again, followed by two more from Betschart and one from Jaci Gilbert (originally credited to Holyk) to end the game 9-4,” said the team manager.
Betschart got another hat trick, while Megan got a brace. Other goal scorers were Quintal, Glen, and Gilbert. Kylee Ilnicki, Sophie Jensen and Madison Julseth also found themselves on the score sheet with assists.
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