by John Humphrey
One of the surest signs of spring in Canada’s sunparlour has long been the Lakeshore Canadiens being on an extended run deep into the play-offs. And the spring of 2023 is no different as the team is once again on another roll in the Provincial Junior Hockey League post-season.
It was known by team management that the 2022-2023 PJHL regular season would be a season in progress in Lakeshore, but with another stellar regular season in the history books, the Canadiens to make progress on yet another deep play-off run.
Last year the team capped off another memorable season by winning the coveted Schmalz Cup.
The Schmalz Cup is awarded to the PJHLs Jr. C champions. The title captured in Guelph on May 15 was the fifth in Canadiens’ history and their first since 1995.
With the win, the Canadiens became the first team to be awarded the prestigious award since 2019 – due to league being shut down because of the pandemic for two seasons
After finishing in second place in the PJHL’s Stobbs Division during the PJHL’s 2022-2023 regular season with a 32-7-1-1 record, the Canadiens have eliminated the Dresden Kings, Wheatley Omstead Sharks and the Essex 73s in successive rounds in the post-season and now prepare to take on the Thamesford Trojans in the PJHL’s Western Conference championship series.
Even before the opening face-off of the 2023-2023 PJHL regular season last fall, the architect of the 2022 Schmaltz Cup champions knew that this past season would be unlike most others in recent history for the Canadiens.
“Last summer we were expecting to have maybe 18 or 19 players back from last season’s team, but after having just 13 guys back, we had to change our plans quickly,” said longtime Canadiens general manager Mark Seguin. “We had to make some trades, more than we are used to making, because we lost some players unexpectedly.
“But we never panicked because we knew that we were going to get better and better and keep that momentum going into the play-offs,” he added.
The Essex 73s, who were celebrating their 50th anniversary in 2022-2023, set the standard during the PJHL’s regular season, finishing atop the Stobbs Division with a 36-4-2-0 record.
“It was still a good season for us, finishing in second place,” claimed Seguin. “With three weeks to go in the regular season, we still had a chance to finish in first place.
“But our ultimate goal was not to finish in first place during the regular season but rather to keep getting better and better as it progressed.”
The Lakeshore Canadiens have finished in first or second place in the PJHL and the Great Lakes Jr. C Hockey League (predecessor of the PJHL) for 20 consecutive years.
“It would have been nice if we had finished in first place this past season to ensure the extra home game for us in the play-offs, but that really doesn’t matter to us,” Seguin contended. “We play well wherever we play and we can beat the opposition both at our rink and at theirs too.”
The 73s won four of the six regular season games against the Canadiens during this past regular season. Four of the six games were decided in overtime.
Seguin was quick to identify the numerous reasons why his team has continued to improve from the start of the regular season in September to the present time.
“The guys who went through so much and accomplished so much with us last season are really bringing it again this season,” claimed Seguin. “Up front, Kyle Walker has been a work horse for us all season in all aspects of the game and Marco Sladoje has been a scoring machine, while Eric Bisson has been spectacular as well.
“On the back end., Josh Cyrenne and Dean Albano have been outstanding at both ends of the ice once again, we have two goaltenders in Romano Liburdi and Nicholas Bolton who get the job done for us night after night.”
“There is never a night where we are not confident with who we have in net for us,” Seguin continued. “Both have tons of playing experience and we think we have the two best goaltenders in the league on our team.”
The Canadiens opened their 2022-2023 post-season in March with a four-game sweep of the Jr. Kings from Dresden.
“In the past, we might have opened the play-offs by starting some bad habits and we would have to work on correcting them in the second and third games of the series but this year we played very well against Dresden and finished them off quickly,” said Seguin. “In our next series against Wheatley, we did not play very well in the first game while they did. And while we also lost the second game in overtime (4-3), we deserved a better fate, and I could see that things were starting to come together for us, and we went on to win the next four games straight.”
The game six series clincher was decided in history-making fashion when Sladoje scored in the fifth period of overtime on a shorthanded effort to give the Canadiens the series win. Bolton stopped 96 of 100 shots for the Canadiens while Sharks netminder Ethan Handley turned aside 87 of 92 in the marathon contest in Wheatley.
In the Stobbs Division final against the long-time rivals from Essex, the Canadiens took the 73s out quickly in five games. While winning all three games played in Essex in the series.
“We played five games and two of them were decided in overtime, so it a very close series between two very good teams,” offered Seguin. “We played 17 periods, and I was happy with the way we played in 14 of those periods.
“And again, our play is continuing to improve as we advance deeper into the play-offs,” he added. “And that bodes well for us getting back to where we want to be this spring, which is another Schmalz Cup title.”
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