Wednesday, @msconduct and myself had a chance to take in the National Aboriginal Hockey Championship being held this year at Bell Sensplex in Kanata. The event is held annually in a different venue each year, so this was a great opportunity to take in some great hockey in a town now starving in the off season.
Get the rest of my notes after the jump:
For more information on the tournament check out the site here:
And the schedule here:
Here's a look at some of the games that we took in:
Final Score: 10-2
Impressions: Both teams were thrown together in a hurry. That much is easy to tell. With Nunavut apparently having a three practice advantage over NWT. And it very obviously showed on the scoreboard. NWT actually had a relatively high shooting percentage. The issue was gaining an maintaining zone time. It just was not happening for them at all. The NWT goalie also played relatively well, but was clearly overwhelmed.
The Nunavut team, also had the better individual players, and provided a very clear advantage for them. Their overall team skating was better. Their shooting was outstanding. The only real issues for Nunavut were depth, and team play. The players simply don't know each other well enough and that led to a glut of individual efforts. No amount of communication really helped the matter, although you can still see that with each shift they are becoming more and more comfortable with their teammates.
Nunavut now awaits their quarterfinal opponent, while NWT has one game remaining against Ontario North this afternoon.
Game 2 : Manitoba vs New Brunswick
Final Score: 8-0 in favor of Manitoba
Impressions: We didn't stay to see the end of this, opting instead to get an early jump on lunch given the lopsided score, but there were a few tidbits I could take away from this game. First, the game was much more competitive than the score would indicate. New Brunswick just didn't get any goaltending. Take nothing away from Manitoba though, which as a team can really shoot the puck, but several of the goals were very stoppable.
The players I noticed the most were Presley Kirkness of Manitoba, and Tyler LaBillois of New Brunswick. Both had some great skating qualities although they had very different styles. LaBillois was clearly the best straight line skater on the ice. His stride was long, and powerful and almost effortless. That's a quality you don't often see at such a young age. At the same time, he had issues with his technical skating, including pivots, and was positionally not very sound. Some of that can likely be attributed to him sometimes being double and triple shifted though.
Kirkness is a much better technical skater. His pivots were outstanding. He has a rare ability to open his hips that most young skaters simply do not possess because they do not have the strength in their hip flexors to be able to do it with any strength or balance. His stride was also very good, though not so far above average to consider him an elite skater. Kirkness also had what was easily the best individual shift of the game in the mid 2nd and even showed skating ability that reminded me of a young Sid the kid. Though obviously the overall talent level isn't the same.
Game 3: Saskatchewan vs. Alberta
Final Score: 3-3 tie
Impressions: Both teams are incredibly talented for their age group. Both skate and pass very well. This ended up being by far the best game of the day, and it may very well end up being the game of the tournament. Both teams were physical, but clean, fast, and exciting to watch. Their depth was also on full display. In particular, there were 3 players the stuck out to me, Eric Roy and Kolton Baptiste of Saskatchewan and Darien Cardinal from Alberta.
Final Score: 9-0 for Ontario North
Impressions: Once again this was an issue of depth for the Northwest Territories. While they do have a few good players, that could likely play on any of the other teams in this tournament, most of their players simple are not of that calibre. After the top 2 players there is a significant drop off. Other teams in this tournament, even the weak ones, don't have such a dramatic dip in talent. It's hard to say with any certainty that anybody playing against the NWT team actually has more or less talent, but I did like the game of Ontario North's Nathan Bruyere. He was physically dominant the whole game, and really did set a tone when one needed to be set. He alone managed to make sure that the entire NWT team kept their heads on a swivel.
Game 5: Girls Northwest Territories vs. Ontario North
Final Score: 5-0 for Ontario North
Impressions: We needed to show some loyalty to our favorite team of the day, so we stuck around to catch the start of the NWT versus Ontario North. Now, for whatever reason the girls tournament was taking place on the big olympic sheet at Sensplex. I'm not sure if that's a rules thing, or if it was just a matter of what ice was available, but that happened to be the case. With all due respect to the girls, who all competed very hard, the big ice was a bit much for them. It clearly changed their game, and created a very disjointed contest. Passes were off, shooting angles were unfamiliar, lanes were unidentifiable, and positional play, something that is usually a strong suit of the women's game was just nonexistent. That's not to say that there weren't several good players on both teams. Obviously, if you look at the team rosters, you'll see that NWT had some difficulty even forming a team to compete this year, but the girls put up a valiant fight, and only allowed the game to get beyond their grasp in the 3rd period. By that time, having half the players that Ontario North had must have really exhausted the girls, and that's an issue that becomes magnified on the larger ice surface.
My overall tournament thoughts:
The level of play is actually pretty good, especially when compared to other tournaments in the age group. Holding the tournament at Sensplex was probably a bit of a logistical nightmare just because there are so many other things going on, but the organizers did a good job. Some things are just insanely overpriced, but the actual cost of watching the games is pretty good as it works out to about a dollar a game. If you're a true hockey fan, and you want to get the inside track on a few upcoming prospects for your local junior teams, this is a good tournament to take in. Depth among all the teams is obviously a bit of an issue, but there are a few players on every team that show some real potential. I would highly recommend taking in a day or two of competition if you have the time and it's in your area. Everyone competing, all the coaches and all the parents were very supportive, even with the competitive nature. It was a good environment to observe especially given all the politics, and competitive bickering that can manage to suck all the fun out of what is a great experience for the kids.
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