The Huntsville Jr. C Hawks will have to wait for another day to win a league championship.
Their hopes were squashed again by the Clarington Shamrox with a 11-6 victory over Huntsville last night in Clarington. The win gave the Shamrox a three game sweep of the best of five series.
The Hawks were forced into a catch-up game situation all night, trailing 10-6 after the second period. The difference was the Shamrox power play which capitalized on seven man-advantage opportunities.
“They’re a good team. They have good shooters and good scorers,” said Hawks’ player Matteo Nobile. “They’re leading the league for a reason. They capitalize on all of their opportunities. They know how to score. They like to pass the ball around and get guys open.”
This is the third year the Huntsville Hawks have failed to get past Clarington. Going into the game coach Joe O’Halloran readily admitted Clarington was the Hawks’ nemesis. He had hoped for a better finish in the regular season standings so that they would not have to go up against the Shamrox quite so early in the playoffs.
The Hawks again had to play with a short bench with only 15 players. Several were not able to make the trip because of work or other commitments.
Marshall Clarke
Hawks’ player Marshall Clarke was also disappointed by the outcome especially after nearly winning game two of the series at the Jack Bionda arena on Thursday night, ultimately losing by only one point. In that game Huntsville had the odd-man advantage twice in the third period and were not able to score.
“We changed up our defense a little going into the playoffs, especially against Clarington,” said Clarke ”and they didn’t really change up their offence. They like to run the pick and rolls, and it wasn’t working for them, but anytime we made mistakes on defense, they capitalized on them. We made a few mistakes, especially getting into penalty trouble.”
Clarke says despite losing again to the Shamrox, the team did show signs of improvement as the season went along.
We need to come together more as a family, where everyone is playing for the team, not themselves; for the logo on the front, not the name on the back. We need to take advantage of their mistakes more. When we have breaks we need to score on them more and when we make mistakes we have to regroup and make sure they don’t score.
Hawks’ player Marshall Clarke
As for next year Clarke is hopeful.
“We only lose two players to age, and we will be getting a lot of Midgets coming up and I think we’ll have a really strong team coming in.”
Peterborough won the other eastern division playoff series in three straight games to advance to the next round.
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