The weekend of April 2nd through 5th Wildcats Squirt team took the final step towards the State Championship. Nothing promised an easy weekend for them. The tremendous resistance that this year's main rivals Jr Kings put up in SCAHA finals made everybody anticipate a tough rematch between the two teams. The expectations came true already in the round robin, where both teams warmed up on Friday easily setting SoCal dominance beating the NorCal's Santa Clara and Cougars, before facing each other in the third game. The first main game started on Saturday at 11am. And it proved to be everything it was expected to be. Kings took the lead 2:0 and were controlling the game until 5 minutes before the end of the third period when Wildcats found a bounce and a deflection to even the score. In overtime both teams couldn't score, so the first game put Wildcats in first place in round robin by goal differential. On Sunday the intensity picked up even more. Wildcats came on strong in the first 5 minutes but were held off by the strong Kings' defense. In return, building on the experience of the Saturday's game, Kings decided that nothing could be better than a two goal lead and quickly scored two goals having capitalized on Wildcats' mistakes. Once again Wildcats found themselves in a hard position of digging out of the two goal deficit. Fortunately, not only Wildcats made mistakes in this game. The first goal in Kings net was scored in a one on one situation resulted from a misdirected pass and a turnover in the neutral zone. It certainly lifted the players' spirits and gave them a glimpse of hope. Very soon the game was tied which gave the Wildcats back a much needed momentum that they lost in the first five minutes of the game. The game evened out, and the Kings were still going strong until a deflection from their defenseman's stick that came from a shot, that seemingly was not much of a threat, didn't find the net over puzzled Kings goaltender. 3:2. This goal gave Wildcats a much needed boost in the luck department. The momentum definetely shifted to their advantage and finally they started to catch a few breaks in what was a very physical and hectic game before. After Wildcats scored the 4th goal the Kings still managed to rally and get one back, but right after that they took a penalty on which Wildcats didn't take long and scored right from the faceoff. From that point on, the Kings went into desperate mode trying to storm the net with lots of individual efforts that were put to rest by the last Wildcats' goal approximately one minute before the end of the game. 6:3 is the final score on the board! And what a great game it was for Wildcats who managed to get the win even though they were forced to come from behind and play very physical game that was not typical during regular season. Congratulations Wildcats!
The prospective 98 Wildcats team receives an invite to travel to Saint Petersbourg for a series of friendly games against top Russian 98 teams
08-Mar-2009
Wildcats are planning to form a team which is to travel to Saint Petersbourg, Russia to play against top Russian 98 teams. The trip is planned for the end of August 20th-30th, 2009.
Squirt A team wins 2009 SCAHA Championship beating Jr Kings 2:1 in the finals. Mite B team also won SCAHA Championship on Saturday March 21 st beating Jr Ducks 4:1. Congratulations Wildcats! Good Luck in CAHA finals in two weeks!
22-Mar-2009
Squirt A team beats Jr Ducks 3:1 in SCAHA semi-finals over the weekend in Escondido and now will play Jr Kings in the finals on March 22nd
15-Mar-2009
(12 older articles are available in the "Team News" area)