The Pas Huskies punched their ticket to the playoff finals of the Norman Hockey Association’s midget AA league Feb. 13 by defeating the Cranberry Portage Winterhawks 16-6 in The Pas to win their best-of-three playoff series two games to none.
Noah Butler led the Huskies with four goals in the deciding game. The Pas beat Cranberry Portage 9-5 the previous day to take a 1-0 series lead. Logan MacDonald led the Huskies with three goals in that game. The series win sends them to the final against the winner of the series between the Thompson King Miners and Norway House North Stars that begins Feb. 19 in Thompson.
Cranberry Portage advanced to the series against The Pas by beating Cross Lake Islanders 1 two games to none in the opening playoff round, which featured the team’s bottom four teams squaring off for the right to face The Pas and Thompson, who finished first and second in the standings in the regular season.
The Winterhawks clinched a series victory Feb. 6 with a goal 10:52 into overtime for a 12-11 win after opening the series the previous day with a 12-8 victory.
The other opening-round playoff series saw the Norway House North Stars win two games to one after scoring 26 seconds into overtime for a 7-6 victory over Cross Lake Islanders 2 Feb. 7. Hunter York had a hat trick for the North Stars in that game while Damian Ross did the same for the Islanders. One day earlier, it was Cross Lake 2 scoring 1:37 into overtime for a 5-4 win that tied the series at one game apiece. Five different players scored for the Islanders in the victory. The series opened with a 15-4 Norway House win Feb. 5.
The two Cross Lake teams faced off in a consolation playoff series Feb. 12-15 that saw Cross Lake 1 emerge with a two-games-to-one victory thanks to a 12-4 win Feb. 15. Julien Monias led Cross Lake 1 with four goals in that game.
Cross Lake 2 were the winners of the second game of the series by a score of 9-6 thanks to two goals each from Claude McKay and Morgan McKay.
Cross Lake 1 opened the series with a 15-4 win that saw Brenston Dorion score six times for the winners.
