Jaguars Win Youth Hockey's Stanley Cup

Professional hockey teams vie for the coveted Stanley Cup.

But for Pee Wee and Bantam youth hockey teams all across North America, the Cup's equivalent for the last 47 years has been an unusual-looking trophy—a 50-inch-long sterling silver hockey stick displayed at the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It's hung next to the names of the teams that win the International Silver Stick tournament every year.

Now the Jaguars Bantam AA team from the Hyland Hills Hockey Association in Westminster has added its name to that envied honor roll. The Jaguars claimed the Silver Stick trophy January 11 by winning the championship game 1-0 deep into an overtime period after battling one of Canada's top youth hockey teams through three scoreless regulation periods.

The Jaguars are the first Bantam AA team west of the Mississippi to win the tournament and the only team from Colorado. It is one of just 16 U.S. Bantam AA teams to claim the top prize in an event that attracts more than 65,000 players from America and Canada who compete in qualifying regional tournaments every fall hoping to attend the finals in Port Huron, Mich.

A Dramatic Win

It was a dramatic 5-4 quarterfinal victory over the Naperville Sabers that emotionally propelled the team into the championship.
With less than four minutes left in the fast-paced game, the Jaguars appeared to be down for the count by two goals.

"We called a timeout after Naperville scored their fourth goal, and I didn't say much to the boys," Head Coach Jamie O'Leary said. "I just told them that they were more mentally tough than what they were showing right then. You could almost visibly see their body language change. It turned from being dejected to being fired up and having to prove something. Once we got that third goal, there was no doubt we were going to win."

On the final day of play, the Jaguars notched a 3-2 win in an early morning semi-final game against the Capital Centre Pride from Lansing, Mich. Then they prepared to meet the Mississauga Braves, Canada's second-highest ranked Bantam AA team. The Braves looked like an experienced, disciplined, physical team—and they were.

"It was a very emotional game with a lot of hard hitting," said Matt McNichols, who centered the Jaguars' top line and scored the game-winning goal. "We laid a lot on the line in that final game. We had come so far, and to see our hopes lying on the line with a single goal, it was pretty intense."

O'Leary described the game as a test of his team's mental and physical endurance.

"(Mississauga Braves) were really big and they knew how to use their size," he said. "But we answered their play. I thought we took the physical game to them even though they had a clear weight and size advantage. It was a controlled strategic game for 8 minutes, followed by 2 minutes of chaos at both ends of the ice.”

Teamwork Was Critical

Teamwork was critical to the team's success throughout the tournament, O'Leary said.

"I conducted individual meetings with players when we arrived in Port Huron to ask everybody to do their specific jobs in each game. We blocked shots, took hits—did all the little things that casual fans might not notice that you need to do to win big games. We rarely saw kids pulling the chute and opting to get to the puck second. They got to the puck first."

Silver Stick officials recognized the outstanding play of four Jaguars by naming them to the Silver Sticks' All-Star Team. They were goalies Ryan Fay and Sammy Bernard-Boymel, defenseman Keegan McCarthy and left winger Mitch Coan, whose clever stick handling and creative skating helped make him the tournament's top scorer with five goals and four assists.

O'Leary said winning the Silver Stick Tournament "is a huge stepping stone" toward the team's year-end goal of winning the state championship. "Now we have the confidence to go out and win another national championship," he says.
Mostly, though, he believed it was fun.

"I came into the locker room before we beat Port Huron and shouted that this is the most fun I've had on the bench in five years of coaching," he said. "They thoroughly enjoyed it and had a great time on and off the ice the whole weekend. It was great being in a true hockey town like Port Huron."

The Silver Stick tournament was founded in 1961 to promote citizenship and international goodwill. Named after the 1905 Ottawa Silver Seven Stanley Cup championship team, it was originally played by youth hockey teams from Ontario, Michigan and New York, but quickly spread throughout Canada and the U.S.

Port Huron has been the tournament's permanent home since 1963.

The town comes to life every January as thousands of youth hockey players and their families descend on it for the tournament.