Eastern Door and North girls repeat, and BC boys surprise

A defending champion managed to retain its title on home ice at this year’s National Aboriginal Hockey Championships (NAHC).
For the second consecutive year the Quebec-based squad called Eastern Door and the North (EDN) captured the girls’ title at the nationals, which concluded on May 4 in Kahnawake, Que.

EDN edged Saskatchewan 4-3 in the gold-medal game.

The British Columbia boys’ club made a bit of history as it captured the gold medal in its division. B.C. defeated Ontario 5-3 in its championship match.

This marked the first time a B.C. club had not only won a championship at the NAHC, which has been held annually since 2002, but also the first time a squad from the province had captured any medal.

A total of 16 clubs (eight female, eight male) participated at this year’s nationals.

The EDN girls’ side also took top honours at the 2012 NAHC held in Saskatoon. Brianne Alfred, the team’s assistant coach this year, said club members were not nervous about having to perform in their home province this time around.

“I don’t think there was any pressure on us,” she said. “We were coming in as defending champs. And we had the support behind us whether we won or lost.”

In the championship final it appeared the Manitoba girls’ team might be the one celebrating following the gold-medal contest.
That’s because EDN trailed 3-1 heading into the final 20 minutes of play. But a three-goal third period outburst saw the EDN team rally for the victory.

“We started off the period with a power play and we got a goal,” Alfred said. “That’s what got us going.”

EDN’s Jessica Kistabish netted the game-winning marker, scoring with less than seven minutes to play in the final period.

The EDN side was undefeated in its six tournament games. A slight hiccup for the squad was its 5-5 round-robin tie against Alberta, a game which EDN led 5-1 at one point.

In its two other round-robin contests EDN edged Manitoba 3-2 and B.C. 3-1. EDN then edged Team Atlantic 3-2 in a quarter-final battle and earned a berth in the gold-medal tilt with a 7-4 triumph over Ontario in its semi-final.

As for the EDN boys’ side, it wasn’t able to duplicate the success of its female counterparts on home ice, at least when it mattered most.

The EDN boys’ team did win all three of its round-robin matches against Team North (Yukon, Northwest Territories and Nunavut), B.C. and Saskatchewan. But it was eliminated from the medal rounds when it was upset by winless Ontario 7-2 in its quarter-final matchup. And then an ensuing setback, 2-1 in overtime against Team Atlantic, in a relegation contest left the team with an official eighth-place finish.

As for the boys’ division, this marked the third straight year Joe Quewezance served as the head coach of the B.C. team. His clubs had placed fifth at the 2011 and ’12 NAHC, both held in Saskatoon.

“The program itself is getting stronger,” he said of his province’s Aboriginal teams.

Proof of this is the fact a total of 87 male players attended the three-day B.C. tryout camp held in Williams Lake in April.

Quewezance also felt B.C. iced some decent squads the last couple of years. But those teams did not have players they could count on to score goals when needed the most.

“This year we had three solid lines that could do that for us,” he said.

Quewezance said the fact no B.C. team had previously won a medal at the NAHC  was not discussed among team members.
“We never really brought it up until the end of the tournament,” he said. “It wasn’t the focus so we didn’t bring it up at any time (while games were on).”

Members of the B.C. side felt  early on that they could have some success at this year’s event. That’s because B.C. edged Saskatchewan, the five-time defending tournament champions, 5-4 in its opening match.

Quewezance’s charges, however, were quickly brought back down to earth as they suffered a 7-2 setback against EDN in their next outing. B.C.’s bench boss said undisciplined play—his club was assessed 16 penalties in the match—was the main reason his club lost that encounter.

As it turned out, it was the only loss the B.C. entry would suffer in the tournament. The club registered a shutout, 7-0, over Team North in its final round-robin game.

B.C. then trounced Team Atlantic 7-1 in its quarter-final game. And it earned a berth in the gold-medal match by edging Manitoba 4-3 in overtime in a semi-final match.