St Malo Warriors set for CRJHL finals re-match

It took a massive effort, but the St Malo Warriors have advanced to their third straight Capital Region Junior Hockey League finals.

The Warriors squeaked past the Selkirk Fishermen 1-0 in a decisive game five to win their semi-final series four games to one.

“Selkirk gave us as much as we could handle,” Warriors assistant coach Patrick Trudeau said.

“Our guys stuck with it. We knew after game three (a 5-0 loss), the world wasn’t ending, we were alright, we were going to bounce back and the guys did here.”

The winning goal came off Teagan Fillion’s stick, who managed to turn what looked to be a broken play into a goal. After failing to get a stick on a stretch pass at the offensive blue line mid-way through the third period, Fillion kept his feet moving. He not only won the race to the puck to beat out the icing, but one-timed the bounce off the boards past Johnny Enns-Demchuk for the series winning goal.

There was more drama to be had in game five. As St Malo desperately defended in the final minutes, a net-front scramble led to a St Malo player purposefully knocking the net off its moorings, with referees whistling for one of the most dramatic plays in hockey — a last minute penalty shot in a playoff game.

That shone the spotlight on an unlikely player.

Goaltender Donavan Bodnar, who hadn’t played a competitive hockey game in more than a year due to an injury sustained while playing for the Raiders Jr Hockey Club of the Manitoba Major Junior Hockey League, got the nod to start after the Warriors picked him up to be their third-string goalie for the playoffs.

Bodnar made the most of his opportunity, putting up a shutout after getting an elbow on the penalty shot.

“It was pretty ballsy,” Trudeau said of his goaltender’s performance, noting the team was careful to make sure Bodnar was completely ready to go and the team was in a good spot before handing the crease over.

“We figured it would be a great opportunity for him and he was lights out.”

Both teams appeared to recognize mid-way through the second period it was likely only a single goal would be needed for a victory, as the players clogged up the neutral zone and looked to avoid making a devastating mistake.

“What we said in the dressing room after two (periods) was ‘we think it’s going to be first to one, and we’re going to be first to one,’” Trudeau said.

“That was our mindset. We weren’t panicking on the bench, we were just sticking with it a shift at a time and it finally paid off.”

Beausejour, now in their third season in the league, took a 2-0 lead in the finals last year before the Warriors stormed back to win four straight and their first CRJHL championship.

Trudeau said the team knows they probably can’t get away with another slow start this year. The Comets had plenty of regular season success against the Warriors, winning four of the five games they played.

“It’s going to be fun,” Trudeau said, noting St Malo’s junior team hasn’t had back-to-back championship seasons in 25 years.

“Our group’s ready. We’ve got a great group of players who like each other.”

The finals get underway March 21 in St Malo, with game two the next night in Beausejour. Game three will be March 25 back in St Malo. A full schedule is available on the CRJHL website.