, 2009
The Fernie Ghostriders are playing the Nelson Leafs in the Kootenay Conference final and the Sicamous Eagles play the Kamloops Storm in the Okanagan Conference final. (As of this writing it was 1-0 Kamloops) Because of time constraints the league voted to make these two series’ a best of five. You gotta wonder why the first series’ weren’t best of fives instead of the conference finals. It had to be a money decision, it most certanly was not a hockey decision.
Nelson has home ice in this series and played the first two games at home. In game one the Nelson Leafs caught the Riders off guard in the first period and quickly got out to a 3-0 lead. After that the Leafs locked down the jailhouse and held on for a 3-1 win. Karl Weberg scored the lone goal for the Ghostriders. In game two the Ghostriders kept it close for a while but lost 6-2 mostly on PP goals. One thing was unanimous in this game, both the Nelson and the Fernie radio guys were appalled at the refereeing. One thing you don’t usually see is top scorers fighting but on Sunday Leaf regular season top scorer Miles Houston and Ghostrider Captain Scott Traverse fought and were ejected at the start of the third.
For the record…Nelson defeated Spokane 4-1 and Castlegar 4-0 to get this far in the post season. The Leafs have home ice in this series because they were the top team in the KIJHL this year. They also scored the most goals with 248 and had the best goals against at 128. So far in the playoffs Dylan Walchuk who just turned seventeen last month is leading the Leafs in scoring with 17 points 11 games. Walchuk is also the KIJHL Rookie of the Year this year and is being actively recruited by both the BCHL and the WHL for next year. If he plays his cards right he’ll never have to pay a cent for his education. 20 year old center Brock Monroe is the Leafs second leading P/O scorer and Tom Rizzardo is their top scoring defenseman. Leaf Coach Simon Wheeldon was named as the KIJHL Coach of the Year and Garrett Beckwith was named as the Top Goaltender. The KIJHL had only one set of awards instead of four sets like they did last season making this year’s awards much more meaningfull.
