Sports | DrumhellerMail

Sabres warm up versus Strathmore for home tourney

Patrick Kolafa
The Drumheller Mail

   The St. Anthony’s Sabres Senior girl’s soccer team showed poise in their first game of the season hosting Strathmore Wednesday afternoon.
   The team has been together for the last few years and this season has moved up to the senior high level. Other schools have more established programs and it showed as Strathmore jumped out to a big lead early.
      Strathmore quickly put up seven goals in early, before Brooklyn Davies scored on a penalty kick to make the score 7-1 at the half.
   “At half time I told the girls, I really don’t care about the score,” said coach Gavin Makse. “All we want to do is win the second half.”
   He said there were a few simple adjustments they needed to make to get them back in the game.
   “They were older and bigger than us and we maybe were a little bit intimidated because they were beating us to every ball. But I knew we had more speed, so I challenged them to win every ball,” said Makse.
   It worked, as the Sabres scored three to Strathmore’s one to win the second half. Davies had a hat trick and Kayla Finkbiner scored. Final score, 8-4.
   The game was a good warm up for the fifth annual Sabres Invitational tournament this coming Friday, September 26. The Sabres will be hosting Notre Dame, Cochrane and Strathmore.
   Coach Makse says last season they were able to beat Notre Dame once, and Cochrane has always had a strong program. He is looking forward to playing Strathmore.
   “Our goal is to beat them. Our girls got enough confidence out of this game today that we could do that,” said Makse.
   St. Anthony’s first take to the field at 9 a.m. versus Strathmore, noon versus Cochrane and 3 p.m. versus Notre Dame in the round robin tournament.

Drumheller Dragons set lofty goals

With the preseason behind them, the Drumheller Dragons are tasked with putting together another successful season, and they have high expectations.
   The Dragons are following up their most successful season ever, going all the way to the AJHL final.
   The 2014-2015 season starts this Saturday, September 6 for the Dragons when they head to Calgary to play the Canucks.
   “We had a really good year last year and we don’t want to fall into a rut. It was such a great ride, we don’t want to sit back on our laurels,” said coach Brian Curran. “We’re trying to get the kids to understand we have quite a mission ahead of us. We want to go back to the finals, we want to win the finals. My goal has always been to put a championship team together every year. That is our goal and we certainly think we have a good start to it.”
   With a handful of preseason games behind them, coach Curran likes what he sees, with a solid number of vets, and some new blood. He credits the thorough job the Dragons’ scouts have done.
   “We are always going to think we want more, but at the end of the day, for us, I like us from the back-out,” said Curran. “Curtis Skip will be our starter, he had a very good camp.”
   On defense, he says they are waiting on a couple players who are at major junior camps, but there is some depth.
   “For us we have some surprises on defense with some of younger players, who are doing well,” said Curran. “Our forwards are getting better. We had six or seven coming back from last year and we added on some good pieces to the puzzle.”
   He said it is going to be another very competitive season, especially in the Viterra South.
   “The South is definitely open to take a run at it. I think we are one of the teams that are right there. There is going to be a lot of parity,” said Curran.
   He is proud of last season’s efforts, and every year sets his sights on winning a championship.
   “I won’t sit back and accept mediocrity. My goal this year for the team is to win a championship. It was amazing to watch the community support we had last year and I think people enjoyed it, we want to do it again,” said Curran.
   “The fans came out and said ‘we really enjoy this kind of hockey.’ Now we want to finish it. We want to put a team out there that is very successful, and have everybody enjoy the product we put on the ice and support and be proud of the team we have here.”
   The Dragons’ home opener is Friday, September 12 when they host the Calgary Mustangs.

Dragons in exhibition action

The Drumheller Dragons were in action last Friday versus the Brooks Bandits at home. They walked away with a 4-2 win. On Monday night they faced the Okotoks Oilers and won 4-3. Exhibition play continues this week with a tournament in Okotoks.

While exhibition games are typically a time to let skaters get a feel for playing in the AJHL and the experience is more important than the score, the Dragons are showing some bright spots early on.
   The exhibition season started last week, and while the Dragons were drubbed in their first outing by the Brooks Bandits with a score of 9-2 on Wednesday, August 20, by Friday they bounced back in their home opener.
   Facing the Bandits again, Brody Valette found the net, along with Craig Martini and Rory Davidson, each on the powerplay. Drew Bish scored the fourth as the Dragons went up 4-2 in the second outing of the season.
   The momentum continued on to Monday night when 302 fans came out to see the Dragons take on the Okotoks Oilers in preseason play. Mitchell Cook, found the net and Tristan Thompson scored twice. Cody Fiala also hit the net as the Dragons went on to a 4-3 win.
   This weekend the Dragons head to Okotoks for a preseason tournament. On Thursday, they play Brooks, Friday they face off against Okotoks and Saturday they play Fort McMurray
   The team’s final exhibition game of the season is Tuesday, September 2, when they host the Kindersley Klippers of the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League.

More Articles ...