Two of six North Okanagan Shuswap teams are returning with medals from their respective provincial minor hockey championships.
The Vernon Watkin Motors Mustangs finished third at the Tier 1 U13 finals in Campbell River, while the North Zone Kings captured bronze at their finals in Kamloops.
TIER 1 U13 @ CAMPBELL RIVER
Their only losses came to the two teams that met for the gold medal.
The Vernon Watkin Motors Mustangs won the bronze medal, finishing the tournament in style Wednesday, March 19, by downing the Victoria Racquet Club Kings 7-1.
The Mustangs went 3-2 in the six-team round-robin, failing to advance to the gold-medal game, which saw the top two teams from pool play go to the final.
Burnaby Winter Club defeated the Semiahmoo Ravens of White Rock 9-4 in the championship. The Winter Club doubled the Ravens 6-3 in the preliminary round Wednesday morning.
Rowan McGrath and Thompson Podollan each scored twice for the Mustangs against Victoria. Jett Menzies, Kingston Prenioslo, and Emmett Davis added singles.
After starting with two wins Sunday and Monday, Vernon fell 7-1 to Burnaby Monday afternoon, then dropped a 3-2 decision to the Ravens.
Cyrus Baines scored the winner for Semiahmoo at 3:06 of the third period, just 48 seconds after Cooper Krause scored his second of the game for the Mustangs to tie things up 2-2. Menzies and Jackson Marchischuk drew assists on Krause's goals.
TIER 1 U15 @ KAMLOOPS
North Zone Kings rallied from a 2-0 first-period deficit, not allowing another marker and scoring seven times on their own, for a 7-2 romp over the Nanaimo Clippers in the bronze-medal game Wednesday afternoon.
Wade Lightfoot led the Kings with three goals, Hudson Deisroth added a pair, and single markers went to Austin Cherry and Ronin Raymond.
The Kings fell 6-3 to the North Shore Winter Club of North Vancouver in the semifinal Wednesday morning.
Nash McStay scored twice for North Zone while Fynn Cruikshank added a single.
The Kings dropped their final pool game Tuesday, 4-1, to the Northeast Trackers of Fort St. John to finish at 2-1 and in second place in their pool.
McStay had the lone goal for North Zone, the Okanagan champions.
NSWC doubled the Trackers 4-2 in the gold-medal match.
TIER 2 U15 @ NANAIMO
The Vernon Vipers finished fourth, falling 7-2 to the Ridge Meadows Flames in the bronze-medal match Tuesday.
Jackson Ford and Aiden Miller scored for the Vipers, who advanced to the playoffs by going 2-1 pool play to finish second. They lost 4-1 to the Cranbrook Bucks in a Tuesday morning semifinal.
Griffin Dickinson opened the scoring for the Vipers in the second period. The Bucks would score a pair of unanswered goals in the second and third periods.
The South Delta Storm, who beat Vernon 5-1 in the opening game for both teams Saturday, won the provincial title, edging the Bucks 3-2 in the gold-medal contest.
TIER 3 U15 @ CRANBROOK
The North Okanagan Salmon Arm Knights missed the playoffs in the 10-team provincials, finishing pool play with a record of 0-2-2.
After playing to draws in their first two contests, the Knights dropped a 7-3 decision to the Quesnel Thunder. Quesnel jumped to a 3-0 lead through the first 16 minutes, and had extended the margin to 5-1 at the first-period intermission.
Tucker O'Brien, Mannix Cleverly and Patrick Johnstone scored for North Okanagan/Salmon Arm, who then finished the tournament Wednesday with an 11-1 setback to the Terrace Kermodes. Terrace scored the game's first nine goals. Kale King had six of the Kermodes' markers.
Matthew Hay had the lone goal for the Knights.
The Powell River Kings defeated Terrace 5-1 in the gold-medal game Thursday morning, March 20.
TIER 4 U15 @ KITIMAT
Langley Eagles scored three unanswered goals to beat the Sicamous Eagles 3-1 in the Battle of the Birds Tuesday.
The loss prevented Sicamous from advancing to the playoffs, finishing pool play at 1-2.
Mitchell Litzenberger opened the game scoring for Sicamous.
Langley advanced to the gold-medal game against the Whistler Winterhawks. Ty Armstrong's goal with 23 seconds left in regulation time gave Whistler a 5-4 win and the B.C. Champions banner.
TIER 1 U18 @ COQUITLAM
The North Zone Kings had a win at the provincial tournament well within their grasp.
Leading 4-0 with 32 minutes to play, the Kings ended up dropping a 7-4 decision to the Victoria Admirals Tuesday to finish pool play at 0-2-1, and out of the playoffs.
Kohen Pounder and Tayden Lake had staked the Okanagan champions to a 4-0 lead with 12:25 left in the second period. The Admirals scored three times in the period's final seven minutes 鈥� including two goals six seconds apart 鈥� and added four more unanswered goals in the final frame.
Parker Aiken had three goals for Victoria, who advanced to the gold-medal game and captured the provincial title with a 3-0 win over the Cloverdale Colts.
