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Gladstone Lakers sweep Neepawa
By Eoin Devereux Neepawa Banner & Press
The second round of the Tiger Hills Hockey League (THHL) playoffs has followed the exact same playbook as the first, with the higher seeded teams bullying their overmatched opponents out of the postseason.
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All four of the divisional semi-final series were 3-game-to-0 sweeps. In the West Division, it was the Miniota/Elkhorn CHawks (#1 seed) and the Killarney Shamrocks (#2) coasting to the next round, having yet to lose a single game in the post-season. As for the East, it was a similar script, as the Gladstone Lakers (#1) and Minnedosa Bombers (#2) also cleared the round without a blemish to their records. For Gladstone, that success came at the expense of the Neepawa Farmers.
The third, and what would end up being the final game of the best-offive between the Lakers and Farmers, was played in Gladstone on Wednesday, Mar. 1. Jesse Toth opened up the scoring less than a minute into the game for Gladstone, to seemingly set the tone for the rest of the night. While Neepawa replied mid-way through the period with a Corbin Mariash goal, the Lakers’
Stephen Kleysen answered back just 47 seconds later. Toth would then score his second of the night a few minutes later, to make it 3-1 Gladstone after the first period.
In the second, Gladstone all but ended Neepawa’s season right then and there, by scoring four consecutive times. Both Kleysen and Toth ended up securing hat tricks, while Jory Geddes added one as well, just to change things up a little bit on the stat-line. Lennon Carr got one back for Neepawa late in the second.
Toth would score his fourth goal of the night and seventh of the playoffs in the third, to give Gladstone a 8-2 advantage. Carr would get one more for Neepawa before the end of the game, but all that would do was make the final score 8-3 for the Lakers.
The East and West Division finals will both start on Friday, Mar. 10, with Gladstone to host Minnedosa and Miniota/Elkhorn having home ice advantage over Killarney. The Lakers/ Bombers game will begin in Gladstone at 8:30 p.m. Game two will follow the next night in Minnedosa with a 7:30 p.m. scheduled start.
