The Northwest Giants went from defending champions to pool division cellar dwellers at the Mac's AAA midget hockey tournament in Calgary.
The B.C. major midget Giants finished off preliminary pool play at the 35th annual AAA midget tournament without a victory following a 3-3 draw with the Moose Jaw Generals on Monday.
A day earlier, the Giants sealed their fate in pool play, losing 3-1 to the Calgary Northstars, leaving the second-place B.C. league club with no chance of a quarter-final berth at the much celebrated Western Canadian midget hockey tournament.
The Giants led off the tournament with three goals in the first five minutes of the opening game against the Leduc Oil Kings on Dec. 27, but were lucky to come away with a 5-5 draw against North Alberta club.
Leduc got out of the first period trailing 3-1, and then counted four unanswered goals in the middle frame to appear to have the game well in hand.
The Giants recovered in the final 20 minutes with a goal from Tak Anholt from Justin Szeto and Colton Kerfoot midway through the third to draw within a goal.
Szeto then tallied the game-tying counter with just 13 seconds left on the clock on a pass from Kerfoot to salvage a point in Pool 1.
But luck and execution abandoned the Giants for the remainder of the round-robin draw.
The following day, the Giants played a Switzerland under-17 team goal-for-goal through the first two periods, before surrendering a 4-3 loss to the European visitors. Tavin Grant made 33 stops in goal in the loss.
On Monday, Quinn Benjafield got the Giants off to a 1-0 first-period lead against the Northstars. But the eighth-placed team in the Alberta midget south division scored three times in the second period, and goalie Derek Mazil stopped 48 shots for the team’s only win of the tournament.
Against Moose Jaw, the Generals took a 2-0 lead after the first period, but the Giants roared back, tallying three straight goals in the middle frame, before affiliate player Regan Seiferling scored the game-tying goal in the final 1:04 of the period.
The Giants finished pool play with a 0-2-2 record and a tournament-high 105 penalty minutes.
