Thursday Morning

Grand Prairie 3 - Lloydminster 2
A huge upset in the AMBHL last night as the Lloydminster Heat fell to the Grand Prairie Storm 3-2 up in Grand Prairie.  Entering the game, the Heat had designs on a pair of wins to overtake the league leading SSAC Southgate Lions, but it wasn't to be.  Instead Lloydminster drop their 4th game of the season to drop to 18-4-1, while Grand Prairie improve to 4-17-3 and now sit tied for the final playoff spot with Spruce Grove in the Charger North.  Kolton Doram scored the game winner goal in the 3rd period, it was his team leading 16th goal and 23rd point of the season in his 23rd game.  Zach Fischer and 98 born D- Kale Clague each had 1-1-2 in the game.  With the two points, Clague now moves in to a tie for the overall lead in defenseman scoring with 28 points.

St. Albert 4 - Spruce Grove 1
Ethan Lazaro had a huge game with 2-2-4 in leading St. Albert to a 15th win on the season to improve to 15-4-5 and sit just 2 points back of 2nd place Sherwood Park and 5 back of league leading SSAC.  Lazaro now has 17-15-32 in 24 games which is just 4 points back of team leader Matteo Gennaro who had 1-1-2 in the game.  Gennaro leads the team with 21 goals in 22 games.  One of the top ranked goalies for the bantam draft on May 3rd - Patrick Dea turned aside 32/33 shots in the win.  Spruce Grove by virtue of the loss now is tied for the 4th and final playoff spot with Grand Prairie.  However, Spruce Grove will receive an automatic birth in to westerns as host this year.  The lone goal in this game came from Justin Jacobson who now has 16 points in 23 games with a league leading 105 pims.

Calgary Royals 5 - Calgary Northstar Sabres 1
The Royals have improved to a remarkable 17-2-3 and have pulled 7 points ahead of the Calgary Bisons for first place in the Challenger South Division of the AMBHL.  As has been the way all year, the Royals got goals from some of their depth as Logan Ferguson and Josh Giacomin each scored a pair of goals.  Ferguson now has 6 this season while Giacomin has 4.  The Royals were missing Kelton Driedger and Andrew McCann in this one.  Zach Sawchenko was once again stellar in goal.

Just a reminder that the AMBHL All-Star game goes this weekend.  We will have a full report come Monday morning.

In other western Canada bantam news, the Winnipeg Monarchs will play a pair of the Saskatchewan bantam "AA" top teams this weekend.  They will head to Tisdale to play the North East Wolfpack on Saturday at 4:45 Saskatchewan time and then travel south to play the Balgonie Prairie Storm on Sunday.

The Monarchs are led by a very talented group of forward who include Zach Court, Jackson Keane, Jeremy Leipsic and one of the top 98 born players in western Canada - Dylan Thiessen.  The Monarchs sit at 11-8-0 in the Winnipeg "AAA" Division this year.

The Prairie Storm will use this as somewhat of a gauge to see where they are at before travelling to St. Albert to take part in the John Reid Memorial Tournament.  The Prairie Storm have a perfect 14-0-0 league record and the only loss has come against the North East Wolfpack by a score of 2-1 in the Regina Bantam AA Tournament back in November.

The North East Wolfpack who have just 1 league loss, coming against Sask Valley will test their depth in the match-up.  Should be a good indicator of how the Saskatchewan "AA" top teams can match up against a "AAA" team from Winnipeg as to just how good these teams really are.