Yorkton's Bantam AA UCT Terriers hockey team put themselves in the same breath of Yorkton's 1996 Western Canadian Bantam Champs with a win at the 2013 Graham Tuer Tournament in Regina, the first time a Yorkton team has won the tournament since '96 when a famous highly touted Bantam prospect named Jarret Stoll wore the Orange and Black sweater of the Bantam Terriers.
Backed by a strong group play performance the AA Terriers dispatched the Humboldt Broncos in the quarterfinals before winning a tight 3-2 contest against the Southwest Cougars in the semifinals to advance to the Championship against the Sask Valley Vipers.
In the final backed by the solid goalkeeping of Alex Geddes the Terriers continued their path to the championship and realized a pre-tournament goal with a 4-1 win over the Vipers to take the championship in what is considered as the best Bantam tournament in the province with over 25 teams from Western Canada.
Head coach Graham Garrett was pleased with his team's performance and mentioned that it was a goal prior to travelling to Regina to win the tournament from both coaching staff and the players after a strong start to their season in the Saskatchewan Bantam AA Hockey League where they had two wins heading into the tournament.
"Based on our league performances and some good practices we felt that we had a real shot to go out and win this tournament," says Garrett.
Garrett mentioned after the tournament that he was most pleased with the way in which the Terriers won, not just winning the tournament.
"We had a ton of contributions from every line and won games in a variety of different ways which is important heading into the rest of the season," says Garrett.
Although the tournament win came at the hands of a balanced effort, the Terriers got another scoring punch from highly touted 2000 born Bantam prospect Carson Miller, who led the team in scoring at the tournament. Miller, who has seven goals and six assists in just seven league games was part of Yorkton's highly successful Pee Wee AA team last season and hasn't missed a beat in 2013/14, helping lift the Bantam AA's to new heights along with several of his former Pee Wee teammates who made the jump this season to Bantam.
Goaltender Alex Geddes was also praised by Garrett for having the best goals against average in the tournament, something that was vital in earning the tournament crown.
"He had something like 1.36 for a goals against average which is extremely impressive at any tournament for a goaltender his age, and to have that type of goaltending is huge because you don't see that type of stuff often," says Garrett who also noted that the defense stepped up to help out Geddes as Tyler Stratechuk who was named to the all tournament team.
"We had a total team effort from every line in every game and diffwerent players stepped up every time we hit the ice and that included our blueline," says Garrett.
This weekend the Terriers are off to Calgary, a tournament that Garrett mentions has stiffer competition, but a tournament he says the players feel that they can go out and have similar success.
"There will be a deeper pool of competition in this tournament, but the players really feel right now that they can play with anyone on any given night so we will see what happens."
The UCT Terriers currently sit in third in the South Division in the SBAAHL with a 6-2 record, the Terriers will play their next home game November 21 at the Farrell Agencies Arena when they host the Regina Pat Blues at 8:00 p.m.
