Wolves punch ticket to final with OT win, News (Ripley Wolves)

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Mar 15, 2023 | Dwight Irwin | 1063 views
Wolves punch ticket to final with OT win
Cody Britton was the Game 7 overtime hero as the Ripley Wolves defeated the Saugeen Shores Winterhawks in a hard-fought series.

Britton's winner capped an incredible shift for one of the team's long-time leaders, after he won a battle at the blueline to dump the puck in deep, laid a hit to retrieve possession, fed it to the point, and scampered to the front of the net where he tipped in the shot over the clearly injured but battling Hawks goalie Jeff Flagler and under the crossbar, nearly blowing the roof off the Ripley barn that was bursting at its seams.

Assists went to Derek Skinner and Ryan Shaw.

Without an out-of-this-world glove save from Jason Hamilton on a point blank slapshot just a few minutes earlier, the first game of the final would've been played north of here instead. Hammy was simply outstanding the entire game, unflappable in overtime, and carried this team to its destination.

Saugeen Shores opened the scoring nine minutes into the first, but Garrett Meurs soon evened the score, from Britton, ending the period at 1-1. The Hawks scored early in the second, but, after an ineffective powerplay ended, Skinner went end-to-end and fired a laserbeam under the bar to knot the game at twos, where it would stay until Britton's heroics.

Shots were 35-31 in favour of Saugeen Shores.

CKNX News interviewed coach Jeff Alcombrack today, so you can read his thoughts here.

Through all this excitement, the Ripley Wolves send our respect to the Winterhawks for not only battling back from a 3-0 deficit in the series to force overtime in Game 7, but also for playing through the shock of the sudden death of long-time volunteer Doug Wood soon after Game 6. We thank the hundreds of fans who joined us in observing a moment of silence prior to Game 7, and the Wolves send our condolences to the Winterhawks organization and Mr. Wood's family and friends. 

The Wolves will now face the Tavistock Royals in the WOAA Sr. AA finals, after the Royals upset the top-seeded Seaforth Centenaires in six games in the other semi-final. Game 1 will be played in Ripley on Saturday, March 18, at 7 p.m., while Game 2 will be in Tavistock on Sunday, March 19, at 3:30 p.m.

Games 3-7 are still to be determined, but watch our Twitter and Facebook pages, as well as this website, for details as they become available.

The Wolves have never been crowned WOAA Senior AA champions. Four more wins will right that.
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