January 30, 2009

Mooretown vs Alvinston
by Kyle MacKinnon

 

The Alvinston Flyers' backs were against the wall when they travelled to Mooretown for the second leg of a home-and-home series last night. After falling to their Lambton County brothers 4-3 at home the night before, the Flyers were in basically in a must win situation if they wanted any hope of making the playoffs.
The responded with a dominating 5-2 performance.
 

Flyers captain Vance Jardine scored the lone goal in the first period to give his team a 1-0 lead.
Alvinston then scored three straight in the second and one more in the third to pull out the must win victory.
Steve Wells, Jordan Flanagan, James McFarlene and Darryl Podolinsky scored for the Flyers, while Tyler Fraser and Spencer Lightfoot scored for the Flags.

 

Brodij Gerryts was outstanding in the Flyers goal stopping 46 of the 48 shots he faced, while Justin Belanger stopped 35 of the 40 shots fired his way in the loss.

With only two games remaining in the Jr. C schedule the Flyers and Blenheim are tied with 25 points each.
Blenheim has a game in hand and would hold the tie breaker.

It will be no easy task for the Flyers to get in, even if Blenheim loses their remaining three games.
The Flyers (11-24-3) play Belle River (24-9-4) and Wallaceburg (18-16-3) in their remaining two games.
Blenheim (12-24-1) will play Wheatley (21-14-4), Dresden (19-12-6) and Mooretown (18-18-1).
If the Flyers do not make the playoffs, they will be the only team in the Great Lakes Junior C League that will not make the post season.

There are only four teams in the South Division (Essex, Belle River, Wheatley and Kingsville) all of whom make the playoffs.

The top four teams in the North division, consisting of Dresden, Wallaceburg, Mooretown, Blenheim and the Flyers, will be assured at least four games after the regular season.

So for the teams that play in the South, before the season even started they knew they were in.
Essex is in first place, having not lost a game during regulation (37-0-1).

As for the Flags, they will meet Wallaceburg in the first round of the playoffs with the Lakers.
Mooretown sits just two points back of Wallaceburg in the standings with three games to go.
The Flags and Lakers split the season series 3-3.