It is unchartered territory for the Leamington Flyers.
The Flyers, winners of the Greater Ontario Junior Hockey League's (GOJHL) Western Conference title, finished second in the Sutherland Cup's round-robin stage and will take on the Stratford Warriors for Ontario junior-B hockey's biggest prize. Game one of the best-of-seven series is Friday night in Stratford.
Head Coach Dale Mitchell told WindsorNewsToday.ca that he's proud of the club's journey this season, and the players are ready for the responsibility that comes with it.
"It was always our goal to get to this point, but obviously, it's everybody's goal at the same time," said Mitchell. "We knew it wouldn't be easy, so we took every series as a small hurdle, a small part of the journey, and we didn't look too far ahead. I think when you take those small victories, it leads to a big goal of ours."
Leamington came off a 2021-2022 campaign when they won the regular-season title in the Western Conference, only to lose to the Chatham Maroons in the conference round of the playoffs. This season, the Flyers repeated as regular-season champions. Mitchell said having the previous season's core, especially on the blue line and in goal, played a role in the Flyers' success this year.
"Last year we were fortunate to have a good goalie tandem as well, and this year we acquired Bryce Walcarius," said Mitchell. "Also on top of having Boe Piroski from last year, we knew our goaltending was pretty solid. Having our defencemen back from last year, one year more mature, we knew we got what we had there."
Leading the scoring for the Flyers were the McPherson twins from Tecumseh. Connor and Ryan McPherson combined for 124 regular-season points, and during the playoffs, have a total of 54 so far. Both players have shown up on the radar of NHL teams, and are the only GOJHL players to appear on the NHL's Central Scouting Ranking list.
Other key players on offence include forwards Trevor LaRue, Owen Holmes, and Hayden Reid. Defencemen who have had the knack of putting the puck in the net include Anthony Ciaramitaro, the regular season's leading blue-line scorer, and Koen Taves, who has had 15 assists in the playoffs.
Mitchell said as the Flyers look ahead to Stratford, one priority will be for Leamington to stay out of the penalty box.
"They [Stratford] got a spectacular power play, no doubt about it, their percentage is through the roof," said Mitchell. "Even when we played them in those two [round-robin] games, they had three goals against us total in three games, and all three were on the power play."
Faceoff Friday night in Stratford is at 7:30 p.m. Game two is set for 5:10 p.m. Sunday at the Nature Fresh Farms Recreation Centre in Leamington.
Complete schedule information is found on the official Leamington Flyers website.
