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AAA Stars season ends with sweep from Regina

Mar 4, 2016 | 6:28 AM

Heading into the 2015-16 season, the Battlefords AAA Stars were back-to-back league finalists thanks to highly offensive lineups.

This year, they expected offense would be hard to come by with players like Layne Young, Troy Gerein and Kaelan Holt heading to the SJHL and Spencer Bast to the WHL, due to them no longer being midget eligible.

Perhaps, what they weren’t expecting was players with one year of eligibility left, like Braydon Buziak, Brandon Lesko and Kent Hanson, to make the jump to the next level.

“We actually had Buziak named as our captain out of training camp,” coach Martin Smith admitted.

“It just seemed like as the weeks went on the chances of him coming back got slimmer and slimmer, because he was playing so well with the North Stars. If we had him, Lesko (Flin Flon Bombers) and Hanson (La Ronge Ice Wolves), all of a sudden you’ve got a real dangerous top line,” he added.

The Stars looked to other players to step up, and Smith mentioned two specifically who did.

“Owen Lamb and Keelan Saworski played third and fourth line minutes last year with a team that went all the way to the league finals,” Smith said.

“They just took the bull by the horns and started to lead our team and coincidentally they were one and two in scoring on our team.”

Lamb finished with 38 points in 43 games, while Saworski tallied 34 in 43 games.

The Stars stumbled into the Christmas break with a six-game losing streak. Afterwards, their playoff push came alive as they went 10-5-1 down the stretch, to reach the playoffs as the eighth and final seed.

“I think the break gave us a chance to recharge a little bit,” Smith said. “Right at New Year’s we lost defenceman Brandon Griffiths to Melville (Millionaires of the SJHL) so we looked at some other guys to step up and everybody started to believe that winning is contagious and away we went.”

As the eighth seed the Stars were matched up with the Regina Pat Canadians in the opening round of the playoffs, which was a rematch of last year’s league finals. The Stars beat the Canadians in the first two games of the regular season, but the next time they matched up in Regina, the Canadians pounded the Stars with back-to-back 7-2 wins.

There was some controversy in game one of the series, as the Stars appeared to tie the game with under a second left in regulation. The goal was originally counted, but after the officials discussed with the time keepers the goal was disallowed. The Stars protested to the league and won the appeal, allowing them to play overtime after game three to decide the winner of game one.

“I think we came in well prepared for game one, we just couldn’t hold onto a two-goal lead after the second period,” Smith said.

“In game two at the Civic Centre I thought we stuck to our game plan but it was the same thing that happened all season long, we didn’t have a lot of scoring and they had a stingy defence and we couldn’t find the back of the net.”

In game two, the Stars were blanked 2-0, before a 6-0 loss in game three. The Canadians then scored in overtime to win game one, completing the sweep.
The Canadians allowed the fewest goals during the regular season, giving up just 88 goals in 44 games. The Stars meanwhile scored 134 goals, which put them ninth in a 12 team league.

The Stars have a handful of players who are eligible to come back for next season, and two of the biggest ones are defenceman Luke Reid and goaltender Lance Alm.

“Luke came in as an underager for us and logged a lot of minutes,” Smith said. “Lance basically split time with Jake Taylor in net but had a few more starts down the stretch.”

Alm was a fourth round pick of the Edmonton Oil Kings in the 2015 WHL draft, while Reid turned 14 on the day of the first game of the season. He is eligible for the WHL draft this season and was one of just two 2001-born, full-time players in the SMHL this season alongside Kaedan Korczak of the Yorkton Maulers.

The Stars have their spring camp April 8, 9 and 10, as they’ll be able to get a closer look at some players who may be in the lineup when the puck drops on the 2016-17 season.

 

Twitter: @craig_beauch

Email: cjnbsports@jpbg.ca