March 9, 2023 · 0 Comments
By Brian Lockhart
The Orangeville District Secondary School Bears boys hockey team captured the District 10 championship with a 1-0 win over Norwell District Secondary School on home ice at Tony Rose arena on Thursday, Mar. 2.
In the final game, goalie Jacob Saldanha got the shut-out for the Bears and was named game MVP. Jackson Shabot scored the only goal in the final on an assist from Ethan Josephson to give the Bears the win.
The Bears had a solid season. After losing three of their four opening games, the ODSS team turned it around and started winning.
They went on an eight-game winning streak to finish the season with a 9-3 record and 18 points.
In the playoffs, the Bears played their quarter-final game with a 6-3 win over St. James.
In the semi-final round, they dispatched Centennial Collegiate with a 7-3 win on Feb. 24 to earn the right to advance to the championship game.
“It was a hard fought game both ways,” said Bears coach Justin Davis. “We started off the year with three losses in our first four games but the boys showed a lot of heart and they showed up to 7:00 a.m. practices. They came together as a team and they became a family. Our kids have won 12 straight games and they find a way to win. It’s not the most talented team we’ve had but they show a lot of character. Orangeville minor hockey doesn’t always have the most success, so it’s great to see kids from this community that play house league, A, AA, and AAA, at all age groups come together to win a championship at home. They’ve doing this for years and this is the seventh (District 10, ODSS) win in 12 years.”
The big upset in District 10 this season came from the Norwell District School. They had a dismal regular season finishing in seventh place in the eight-team field, winning only two out of 12 games.
However, when the playoffs started, the Norwell team came alive, knocking out the second-place John F. Ross team in the quarter-finals, then winning 4-3 over the first-place Centre Welling District High School team in the semi-final to earn a place in the District final game.
The championship win gave the Bears the right to advance to the regional competition at the Central Western Ontario Secondary Schools Association hockey AAA championship in Fergus on Mar. 6 and 7.
End results of CWOSSA were not available at press time.