Grizzlies cap season with Keystone Cup victory

By MARK HUNTER
Daily News Sports Reporter
One by one, after receiving their gold medals, the Revelstoke Grizzlies lined up on their blue line, with each player draping his arms over his neighbours’ shoulders.
When the Keystone Cup was finally handed out, everything was done in an orderly fashion, with each player getting a turn to lift it over his head.
And when the team crowded around for its post-game chant, every voice was heard.
Yes, it was a team effort, through and through.
The Grizzlies beat the Tri-Town, Sask., Thunder 5-3 on Sunday to win the Keystone Cup Western Canadian junior B hockey championship at McArthur Island Sport and Event Centre.
It was the third title in three weeks for Revelstoke, which won the KIJHL title on March 27, and the Cyclone Taylor Cup, the provincial championship, on April 4.
The Grizzlies didn’t have a superstar — instead, they relied on spread-out scoring and solid goaltending from Andrew Parent. The tournament MVP was defenceman Caleb Roy, who led the tournament with 13 points, all assists.
“We didn’t rely on one guy — when you look at our scoring, everyone contributed,” said Troy Mick, the team’s co-owner, general manager and head coach. “That’s what the difference was — we were able to run four lines . . . our depth was a big reason why we won.”
Of the 900 or so people who turned out to the Sport Centre on Sunday, about 500 were rooting on the Grizzlies. The team went to great pains to thank the fans during the celebration with the trophy.
“It’s huge to come out for the warm-up and hear the horns and see everyone here,” said Mick. “The town got behind us all season.”
Roy got things started midway through the first period on Sunday.
Standing behind his own goal line, he threaded a tape-to-tape pass onto the stick of Luke Richardson, who was skating along the far blue line. Richardson broke in alone and roofed a shot past Tri-Town goaltender Theo Toma.
The same two players hooked up to give Revelstoke a 2-0 lead in the second period, when, on a power play five minutes in, Richardson tipped in Roy’s shot.
The Thunder fought back, with Alex Hauswirth scoring on a power play with 1:21 remaining in the second, and Patrick Tran scoring — also on a power play — 2:31 into the third period.
Tri-Town lost its composure after that, taking back-to-back penalties, giving the Grizzlies a 64-second five-on-three. The Thunder killed the first penalty, but Faiz Khan managed to get a puck through Toma’s legs at 6:34 with Revelstoke still a man up.
The Thunder found more penalty trouble right after, and lost two of its top forwards and its head coach in the process. Tran was ejected at 8:38 for a check to the head, and Shawn Shackleton was kicked out 1:29 later for checking from behind.
Thunder head coach Randy Cuthill was furious, and earned a trip to the locker room by throwing a towel on the ice.
Richardson finished off his hat trick — Roy had an assist — at the tail end of the Shackleton minor, and the goal turned out to be the winner.
“I hate to say anything really negative about the officiating, but I don’t know,” said Tri-Town assistant coach Ken Soucy. “You can’t blame it on the officials — we’ve got to score goals. But, yeah, we were frustrated by the officiating.”
Tri-Town’s Jody Blais scored with 5:46 remaining, cutting the lead to 4-3, before Kamloops native Ben Bula was credited with an empty-net goal that Trevor Esau appeared to score.
Parent made 31 saves in the victory; Toma stopped 36 shots.
The teams were a study in composure — the Thunder, for losing it, and the Grizzlies, for keeping it.
Revelstoke never appeared frazzled — not when the Thunder came back to tie the game 2-2, and not when Tri-Town was pressing late.
“We knew what we had to do,” Roy said. “We had won two championships before this, so we knew we had to play our game.”
The victory marked the end of a magical season for Mick, a former Kamloops Blazers head coach who joined the Grizzlies last summer, buying into the squad with Lou Hendrickson, Mike Roberts and the father-son pair of Joe and Andrew Kozek.
The Grizzlies went 35-9-1-5 during the regular season, before losing only five of 25 postseason games — two of them in overtime — for a combined record of 54-12-2-7.
The Keystone Cup was icing on the cake.
“As a coach, you lay out a template that you believe will bring you success, but you need the horses to do it,” Mick said. “From our first day, I had a good vibe that we had something special here.
“Talk is cheap, but we followed through with the third trophy here.”

mhunter@kamloopsnews.ca