Flyers No Match For Kings

The Dauphin Kings continued their recent roll tonight.

After a slow start, they rebounded very nicely in a big 5-1 win against Winkler.

The Flyers came in as the second-place team in the league.

It was Dauphin’s third win in a row.

”After that slow start, we started doing the little things right and we filled up the middle lane very well,” said Doug Hedley. “Gavin Wendorf had a great game, he’s been one of our best players.”

Carter Sawchuk, Grady Hobbs, Brendan Arnold, Brayden Pawluk, and Noah Wagner scored in the win for Dauphin.

Levi Mitchell was once again tremendous for Dauphin as he made 36 saves in the game.

”I had the chance to play pretty loose because we really got things going offensively,” said Mitchell after the game. “It was a confidence booster for us and now it’s time to move forward.”

Dauphin will look to make it four in a row when they play Steinbach twice this weekend. Both games will be at Credit Union Place.

Details: Contributed by Darnell Duff; Published: Feb 4, 2020 - 10:32 pm

The best women's curling teams in the province took over the Riverdale Community Centre last week for the Manitoba Scotties Tournament of Hearts. The tournament would send the winning foursome to the National Scotties Tournament of Hearts later this month in Moose Jaw.

The event kicked off on January 29 and it ran right through this past Sunday. The semi-final and final was broadcasted on Sportsnet.

"Things couldn't have gone better. It was a packed house all week, we're extremely happy," said Les Wedderburn, Chair of the event. "Everything went smoothly, it was phenomenal."

"Jennifer Jones had a comment that she would come back to Rivers for an event like this anytime," he added. "We had great volunteers and all of the feedback was positive."

The field for the event was a stacked one. It included the likes of Team Jones, Team Kerri Einarson, Team Tracy Fleury, and nine other teams who were all looking to pull off an upset.

In a new format, the top two teams from each group advanced. Team Fleury and Team Kristy Watling advanced from the Black Group while Einarson and Team Jones advanced out of the Red Group.

curling action shot On Sunday morning, Team Jones scored one in the 11th end to beat Team Fleury, 8-7, to advance to the final.

Jones would score two points in the first end of the final, however; it wasn't mean to be. Team Einarson which features Val Sweeting, Shannon Birchard, and Briane Meilleur proved to be too strong as they won 8-6.

The win means Team Einarson will represent Team Manitoba at the Scotties Tournament of Hearts from February 15-23 at Mosaic Place in Moose Jaw.

"It was almost surreal to have the best teams here," concluded Wedderburn. "Especially to have three of the top teams in the world, that's pretty incredible. It's almost unbelievable when you think about it."

Despite losing the final, Team Jones will have another chance as will Team Fleury. The two teams will play against each other on Friday, February 14. The winner will be Team Wild Card when the tournament gets underway on Saturday morning. The two teams are playing in this game based on their ranking within Canada.

Details: Contributed by Darnell Duff; Published: Feb 4, 2020 - 3:00 pm

Later this month, a man who calls Brandon his home will head to Russia. Brayden Payette will play on Team Jacques Gauthier for the 2020 World Junior Curling Championships which take place from February 15-22, in Krasnoyarsk, Russia.

At the nationals earlier this month in Langley, Payette and the rest of the foursome had a near-perfect week to earn their spot. Playing as Manitoba #2, they won 10 games and they capped things off by beating Newfoundland and Labrador in the final, 8-6.

Their only loss of the entire tournament was against Nova Scotia in their third game.

"It honestly still hasn't sunk in. We all feel when we get closer to Russia, we'll realize that it's actually real," said Payette. "It's still hard to believe that we won nationals."

The team was Manitoba #2 because of what happened on the provincial stage. They dropped the provincial final against Lawson Yates and the rest of Team Brett Walter. However, Manitoba had two spots at the nationals this year which meant they would still get the opportunity to play. In the provincial final, they still played quite well, but they really did ramp it up on the national stage.

"We were lucky that we had that chance this year," said Payette. "We were joking all week, who needs a provincial title if you can still win the national title. It's still our joke to this day."

Of their 11 games at the nationals, Payette and the rest of the foursome scored at least six points in eight of them. They also got a sense of revenge against Yates and his team as they beat them, 9-4 in the round-robin.

The team from the Assiniboine Memorial Curling Club in Winnipeg also features Zack Bilawka and Jordan Peters.

"We stayed really focused all week and we learned a lot from our provincial final loss," continued Payette. "We just played really solid curling all week; it's actually kind of unreal how well we played."

In perhaps the comeback of the entire tournament, the team trailed Quebec 6-0 after three ends in their first game. Manitoba #2 ended up scoring 10 points the rest of the way to eliminate that deficit and win 10-9.

They followed that up with a win against New Brunswick before they dropped their one and only game against Nova Scotia. The rest of the way, they won eight straight games.

The team will now get all fitted in their new Canadian apparel before they board a plane with Krasnoyarsk being their destination. The team's first game is on February 15 against the United States.

In all, they'll play nine round-robin games through February 20.

"This has been a dream of mine since I was a little kid," said Payette. "I've watched this event so much and it's always been a goal of mine to take part in it. It's a dream come true and I can't believe it."

Standing in Canada's way of becoming a World Champion is the U.S., Sweden, Switzerland, Italy, Norway, New Zealand, Germany, Russia, and Scotland.

Payette and the rest of this year's team will certainly have some big shoes to fill when the event begins. Tyler Tardi and his Canadian team won the past two world championships.

Carberry's Braden Calvert also won the event back in 2015.

On February 19, you can watch the team take on Russia when they battle them at 6:00 a.m. local time.

Details: Contributed by Darnell Duff; Published: Feb 4, 2020 - 12:00 pm

The Dauphin Kings have been on a roll over the past few days and they'll look to keep that going this evening.

Winners of two straight, Dauphin returns to Credit Union Place to welcome the Winkler Flyers to town, who are second in the league.

Dauphin's offence has scored 10 goals in their last two games while Winkler has also scored the second most goals in the league at 192.

Dauphin's power play continues to be an issue as it has just three goals on its last 43 chances.

Game time tonight is set for 7:30

Details: Contributed by Darnell Duff; Published: Feb 4, 2020 - 5:13 am

In the 2013-14 season, the Dauphin Kings were set to host the Western Canada Cup at Credit Union Place. That meant they were just one step away from advancing to the Royal Bank Cup.

To do so, a good performance at the WCC was required and they acquired a few solid pieces to give themselves their best chance. One of the pieces that they did pick up was Michael Stiliadis. A native of Woodbridge, Ontario, Stiliadis began that season with the Georgetown Raiders of the OJHL where he would play 12 games before he joined the Vernon Vipers of the British Columbia Hockey League.

Stiliadis would play just three games with Vernon before he was acquired by the Dauphin Kings. He would quickly become a fan favourite and also one of the best goaltenders in the league.

He also provided Dauphin fans with something extra to cheer about on December 20, 2013. Playing against Waywayseecappo, Dauphin was up 4-2 late and the Wolverines pulled their goalie. Wayway shot the puck right at Stiliadis and he caught it and shot it down the ice and it went in as he scored his first-ever goalie goal.

"You don't see a goalie score a goalie very often, so I'll never forget that moment, it was pretty incredible," said Stiliadis.

In 26 regular-season games, Stiliadis had a 2.48 G.A.A to go along with a solid .914 save percentage. Dauphin went on to claim the Sherwood Division crown that season by 15 points over the Virden Oil Capitals.

In the playoffs, Stiliadis continued to do his thing as he earned four straight shutouts in the first round of the playoffs as the team rolled past OCN. They would follow that up with a four-game sweep against the Oil Capitals.

In the final, Dauphin ran up against a Winnipeg Blues team that finished fourth in the Addison Division. However, the Blues came out and beat Dauphin in five games to claim the Turnbull Trophy.

"I knew coming to Dauphin was going to be a great chance to have a memorable season and prove Vernon wrong for trading me away," said Stiliadis. "For me, I thought it was a successful year, although we didn't win the league. That Winnipeg team was really good and they deserved it."

As mentioned above, the season, however, for Dauphin would continue as they hosted the WCC and a great performance was what happened. They finished first in the round-robin and they defeated Yorkton in the finals to claim a berth to the Royal Bank Cup.

"That was great, we were all fired up and we did what we needed to do," he continued.

Dauphin would continue to roll at the Royal Bank Cup. They once again finished first in the round-robin. However, they were defeated by Carleton Place in the semi-final. Despite not travelling back to Dauphin with a national title, Stiliadis did travel with some individual hardware that he earned.

Michael won the Roland Mercier Trophy which is awarded to the tournament's Most Valuable Player. He was also named the tournament's Top Goaltender. In his five games played, Stiliadis had a .930 save percentage and a 2.32 G.A.A.

"I had confidence going into the tournament knowing I could help the team win games," added Stiliadis. "We were projected to be the odd team out of the playoff picture, but we rallied off three straight wins in the round-robin and one was against Vernon which was an extra great feeling."

"The whole experience of playing in the nationals was amazing, it's something I certainly won't ever forget."

After that one season with Dauphin, Stiliadis would go on to join the Victoria Grizzlies before he ended his junior career with the Toronto Blue Ice Jets in the 2015-16 season. As the door to his junior career closed, the door to his professional career would open.

Stiliadis would end up playing three professional seasons in Sweden before he came back to North America. He began this season in the Southern Professional Hockey League with the Roanoke Rail Yard Dawgs. Stiliadis is now playing in the Federal Prospects Hockey League with the Watertown Wolves, a team that acquired him from Elmira, who also plays in the FPHL.

The team has won six straight games and they're in second place in the Eastern Division. He's gone 4-2 this season and he sports a very solid .924 save percentage.

"It's been a pretty solid year for me individually and of course, our team is having success which is always the goal," concluded Stiliadis.

Details: Contributed by Darnell Duff; Published: Feb 3, 2020 - 1:45 pm

Cole DeKoninck has been named a runner-up for the MJHL's Defenceman of the Month for January.

In 11 games last month, DeKoninck had three goals and 10 assists.

The Lorette native leads all defenceman in scoring this year with 51 points and he's 10th in the league's scoring race.

He had four assists this past Friday in a win against Virden and he added an assist in a 3-2 win on Saturday against Selkirk.

Details: Contributed by Darnell Duff; Published: Feb 3, 2020 - 1:13 pm

The Roblin Atom Stars put together a very good weekend in The Pas. In a tournament, they played in the "A" Division and they ended up finishing in second place.

In a very entertaining final, the Stars came up just short in overtime against Thompson, 3-2.

Prior to that loss, they beat Flin Flon, 6-2 and they tied Thompson at one. The team secured a 13-0 win against Cross Lake and a 7-3 win against The Pas.

Details: Contributed by Darnell Duff; Published: Feb 3, 2020 - 12:58 pm

The Parkland Bantam Rangers put on an offensive clinic yesterday, something they have done many times this season.

Playing the Central Plains Capitals, the Rangers put up 13 goals and they recorded 96 shots. Ty Hogue of the Caps' made 83 saves and was definitely the reason why Parkland didn't score many more goals.

Brayden Dube led Parkland with five goals and he added two assists. Dube now has 116 points (65G) this season. Carter Zalischuk had two goals in the game.

Bo Eisner, Kyan Grouette, Hayden Seib, Brandon Lyon, Linden Smigelsky, and Will Munro all scored one goal each in the big win.

The Rangers' next game is on Saturday afternoon at 12:00 inside of Credit Union Place. On Sunday, they'll play the 31-0 Winnipeg Warriors at 12:00 p.m. in Russell.

Details: Contributed by Darnell Duff; Published: Feb 3, 2020 - 11:12 am

Team Turko Fertilizer skipped by Dauphin's Kyle Forsyth is on top of the Parkland. The foursome which includes Jarvis Whyte, Cody Hill, and Trent Hill won the Parkland Super League of Curling last night inside of the Dauphin Curling Club.

The team earned a berth in the final by beating Team Oil Depot skipped by Jim Todoruk, 6-2 in their semi-final. In the final, they continued their strong play by beating Team Nutrien Ag Solutions skipped by Glenn Toews, 6-5.

This year was the first time the foursome played together in this league, although they have played together before outside of the league.

"It was good, we battled hard all year," said Forsyth. "We had our ups and downs, but we battled through them and kept every game close."

The team was nearly unbeatable all season long. In the round-robin, they went 11-3. So add the two playoff wins and the team finished the season at 13-3 and they now have four plaques and will forever be known as Super League Champions.

"We never got down on ourselves if we were trailing, we just played our game every time out," continued Forsyth.

The team was also sponsored by Fusion Credit Union, Mossey River Inn, Style Mercantile, and Tryco Excavating. The winning feeling certainly wasn't a first for Kyle. He won the league three seasons ago and four seasons ago.

That means in less than five years, the Dauphin native has skipped a team to a title three times and the feeling of winning never gets old.

"It's a great feeling to win the league again," added Forsyth. "I have to give my team a ton of credit; they played so well and gave us a chance to win every time."

The team plans to play again next season as they'll look to repeat as champions.

Next up for Kyle is the Travelers Curling Club Provincial Championships that take place later this year. That team includes Forsyth, Darius Vendramin, Cody Hill, and Jarvis Whyte.