麻豆社区

It was the best of times or the worst of times for Mustangs players, depending on which team they were playing for last weekend in Richmond, B.C.

The Whitehorse Peewee A Mustangs rode Dylan Cozens's hot hand to a tournament championship, while the Midget A Mustangs went winless in four attempts in their respective divisions at the 11th Annual International Seafair Icebreaker Rep Tournament.

Both clubs competed at the Tier 2 level.

Led by Cozens's 21-goal performance, the Peewee Mustangs recovered from a close tournament-opening loss to run the table and finish first in their division.

In the final, Whitehorse avenged their loss to South Delta by securing a 7-4 win.

Cozens scored five times and added two assists on goals by Isaac Williamson and Brett Walchuk. Bryce Anderson had five assists, and Williamson had three.

Cozens, a sophomore player, earned high praise from coach Kirk Gale.

"Dylan's a big strong kid who can shoot and skate, and he's very hard to defend against,鈥� Gale told the Star.

On Friday, the Mustangs opened with a 5-4 loss to South Delta. Cozens scored a hat trick while linemate Anderson had a goal and two assists.

Goalie Dawson Smith played the opening game, before rotating games with Quinn Howard.

Cozens would score seven of the eight goals in the Mustangs' 8-2 win over Vancouver Saturday, while Anderson had the other alongside four assists.

On Sunday, Cozens factored into all six goals, scoring three of them and adding three assists in a 6-2 win over Everett. Wyatt Peterson, Isaac Williamson and Anderson had the other goals.

On Monday, the club entered the semifinals versus Portland, beating them 5-1 on the strength of another Cozens hat trick and goals from Oscar Sawicki and Anderson.

"I didn't know what to expect to be honest,鈥� Gale admitted. "I knew the kids would be tested, so we just tried to prepare them the best we can. We accomplished something here, but there's still lots to work on.鈥�

The Midget Mustangs, meanwhile, got a rude welcome to Outside tournament play, said coach Barry Blisner.

With much of his team consisting of first-year players that graduated from last year's bantam squad that won multiple tournaments, Blisner said the adjustment to the next level was more difficult than expected.

"It's not like last year for a lot of the guys where we won most tournaments,鈥� he said. "We had good players and a good team and we were able to win most of the tournaments we got in just by hard work and the talent we had. This is a big step up.鈥�

The midgets opened their tournament Friday night, dropping an 8-2 decision to a club from Arizona. Devon Troke got the start between the pipes.

Goals from Spencer Lessard and Levi Johnson early in the game kept it close for a while, but a slew of penalties combined with a great Arizona powerplay unit did the Mustangs in.

"The wheels kind of came off and we took a lot of silly penalties,鈥� Blisner admitted. "It was a well-reffed game, but we just got down and a little frustrated. In that game in particular, it really hurt us. We couldn't blame anybody but ourselves.鈥�

On Saturday afternoon, the club was unable to supply goalie Josh Tetlichi with any offence, dropping their second game 4-0 to Juan de Fuca. The two goalies would split the final two tournament games.

In their third game Sunday, the Mustangs lost 5-1 to a squad from Portland. Defenceman Jack Blisner scored.

"It was 2-1 at one point and we were playing pretty well,鈥� coach Blisner explained. After that, penalties once again did them in.

The Mustangs didn't just lose the game. Whitehorse amassed more than 80 minutes in penalties and lost top players Johnson, Nick Dobush, Braden Paun-Burnett and Kadin Kormendy to game misconducts.

Without those players for Monday's match, the Mustangs would lose 6-0 to host Seafair.

"It was hard,鈥� Blisner said. "We went 0-4. To be honest, for the year we kind of expect that we'll probably have a tough go. We've got 10 or 11 first-year guys and that's life.

"It was definitely a learning experience,鈥� he added. "We're probably not going to win a whole lot of tournaments this year, but you certainly can't mail it in. In a lot of ways, it's going to be a development year for a lot of them, and they've got to understand that and go from there.鈥�