Gaels Too Much on Home Floor
By Jake Dobson “Voice of the Saints”
For the third time this season the Green Gaels have defeated the Newmarket Saints with a 9 - 6 home floor victory. This loss is extremely disappointing for a Saints team that really wanted to beat the Gaels before the end of the regular season. The Gaels have been the best team in the Eastern Conference all season long and will be the early favourite in the playoffs. The loss kills any chance the Saints had at home floor advantage in round one of the playoffs but they can still finish in second place in the Mid East division ahead of Barrie. Barrie and Newmarket square off on Saturday night at 8pm at the MAGNA CENTRE not the Ray Twinney Complex. A Newmarket win combined with a Barrie loss in their final game against Oakville (14 - 3) and the Saints will finish in second in the Mid East.
The first period of this game made it look like we were in for a high scoring game. The Gaels scored 5 and the Saints responded with 4 in the opening period. Newmarket got goals from Jake Donato, Nick Trach, Ryan Besse and Logan Hurst in the period. Besse and Hurst’s goals came just 12 seconds apart and once again the Saints played an even period with the Gaels. Of the nine periods the teams have played seven of them have been even.
It was the second period that was the eventual downfall of the Saints who allowed three goals and could only get one themselves, coming off the stick of Ryan “Shooter” Besse. It was not as if the Saints did not have chances as the Gaels took 11 penalties in the second period. It did not help that the Saints leading scorer and captain Patty Lee missed five of these minutes in the box due to a fight.
The third period was very defensive as each team only managed one goal, but for the Gaels it was enough. TJ Cook was the scorer for Newmarket and Shawn Beer assisted for one of his three helpers in the game. The good news for the Saints is that they can play with the best teams in this league, the bad news is the Gaels have done just enough to beat them all three times. Newmarket will have to bring even more effort if they hope to advance in the playoffs. If the playoffs were to start today these would be the match ups.
(1) Green Gaels (32 pts 19 GP) vs (8) Awkwasasne (16pts 19 GP)
(2) Oakville (28 pts 17 GP) vs (7) Newmarket (26pts 19 GP)
(3) Nepean (18 pts 18 GP) vs (6) Barrie (27pts 18 GP)
(4) Mimico (28pts 18GP) vs. (5) Halton Hills (28pts 19GP)
With divisional games remaining for all teams the standings will change again before the end of the weekend. In any event the playoff teams are very close and it will be the little things that determine an Eastern Conference Champion.
Next Game Saturday night vs Barrie at 8pm at the MAGNA CENTRE on Mulock Drive.
GO SAINTS GO
