NEWS RELEASE
ORILLIA LADY KINGS SENIOR TEAM
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The BMO Nesbitt Burns sponsored Lady Kings Senior team traveled to Halton Hills on the weekend and played a pair of games in wonderful weather conditions and with varying success.
Orillia would open the day with a match against the newest team in the loop, St Catharines Athletics, and the game indicated that the Athletics have some work to do as they were defeated by a 17-0 margin.
Orillia’s roster, made of a majority of Queen's University players, accounted for 14 of the 17 goals scored by the Lady Kings. Pacing the attack would see sophomore Jordan Kummer recording a three-goal, three-assist effort while Kiah Shanks adding to her goal scoring dominance by adding five goals of her own in the lopsided affair.
Emily Arkell with three goals, Rachel Mochulla, Morgan Vickers and Sara Wood with singles accounted for the fellow Golden Gaels point getters. Western University’s Kyra Meredith with her own two-goal performance was aided by a single marker from McGill’s Camille Vibert as well. Canisius College’s Emily Van Kessel earned the win in net and the rare shutout in the field game.
Game 2 would be a case of déjà vu for Orillia as the Lady Kings would face off against the highly ranked and long-time nemesis Kawartha as they would eventually battle to a 10-10 tie.
Orillia controlled the face-off circle the majority of the game and would build a 5-2 lead into the half led by a hat trick effort from Annie Lloyd and singles from Kiah Shanks and Camille Vibert. Defensive presence was the key to the first half success as Morgan Vickers, Rachel Mochulla, Emily Arkell and Kendall Boyd played strong and aggressively limiting the high powered Kawartha offence to those two goals.
Orillia would eventually build on their lead getting to a 10-5 lead with 7:50 remaining in the second half. Last week’s experience against Six Nation whereas the Lady Kings allowed momentum to reign over them and allowed the opposition to inch back into the game wouldhaunt them again.
Kawartha would score five unanswered goals and the game-tying goal with 0:17 left in the match to gain the deadlock. Having a short bench may have been a factor, but full points to the opposition fighting back. Remaining point getters for the Lady Kings would see Kelsi Pritchard adding a pair in the second half while Kyra Meredith (1G, 1A), Vibert and Shanks added singles. Lloyd finished the match with a three-goal, two-assist effort in the well-played and entertaining match.
Orillia now travels to Oshawa to finish off regular season play and face Toronto Beaches and Mimico Mountaineers in hopes of finishing high in the A division rankings.
A first-place finish could still be in the cards as the Lady Kings have only suffered that one loss to Six Nations!
The provincial playdown begins the weekend of June 22 in Brampton and Orillia hopes to defend its provincial championship again in the highly competitive A division.
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