The Huntsville Huskies midget girls’ hockey team had the opportunity to play in the Ontario Women’s Hockey Association championships in Mississauga on April 11 to 13.

The hockey was excellent, and the girls played their hearts out, but regretfully did not win a medal. However, they did come an impressive fourth out of 20 teams in the C division.

On Friday evening they met their first opponents, the Seaforth Stars. This team was very aggressive and a late start for the girls. The girls came out strong but were unable to defeat the team, coming out on the short end of a 3-2 score. Chelsea Babb scored both goals for this game and Alison Carter was strong between the pipes.

Saturday the girls were determined to put everything they had into their game. The first game of the day had them face the Keene Wolverines. Adele Clarke and Babb again scored goals for a 2-0 victory. Marlee Bullen, Kylie Wurdell, and Carley Gray, and Michelle Stinson assisted on the forward line, while Jessie Sibeon, Catherine Scott, Paige Klinkman, Michelle Everist, Desiree Langford, and Amethyst Lupton showed strong defence. Goalie Kelsey Preston played this game with determination and was very solid.

The second game of the day was against a team from Honeywood and the Huskies again dominated with a 4-1 win.

Carter stepped up and helped give the girls the solid lead, and showed everyone they were a team to be reckonned with. Again Babb lit up the scoreboard in this game with the hat trick.

The final game of the day had the girls waiting until late at night for a quarter-final game. They faced a very strong team from Mount Forest. Again, Huntsville was victorious in a 2-0 game, backed with outstanding goaltending by Preston.

On Sunday morning in the semifinal game the Huskies lost to Goderich, who were last year’s C division champs, in a very close game. In the last three minutes of the match, Goderich fired a heartbreaking goal and won 1-0.

Huntsville had played with such drive and heart that it was a difficult loss. This put them into the bronze medal match against Embro later that afternoon.

The Huskies were up by 2-1 in the final period of the medal game, but Embro came on strong and tied it up, taking the game into overtime.

The Embro team had lost their 24-year-old coach two weeks earlier in a car crash, so their players were playing with much conviction and determination. Six minutes into the overtime period Embro scored, stealing away the Huskies’ chance at a bronze medal.

Carter again was the goalie and showed outstanding maturity and character in her play this game, as well as all the girls who were very tired and who played teams with benches of 17 to 20 players, and much older, experienced players.