RED DEER – Four Alberta Female Hockey League U18AAA teams are competing in two Provincial Qualifier series, with playoffs getting underway this weekend.
The first series between the Calgary Fire and Rocky Mountain Raiders begins on this afternoon, and continues tomorrow (March 9 and 10) while the St. Albert Raiders Slash and Lloydminster PWM Steelers meet on March 15 and 16. The winners of each series book their ticket to the Provincial tournament.
The top two teams in the league have already qualified for Provincials. The Red Deer Sutter Fund Chiefs won 24 of 30 games to finish in first place with 72 points. Red Deer is this year’s Provincial host, meaning that second place Edmonton Jr. Oilers White have also qualified for the year end tournament with 21 wins and 64 points. Both the Chiefs and Oilers White won eight consecutive games to close out the regular season.
Lyvia Butz of Red Deer had a dominant season, scoring at over a point-per-game clip with 45 points in 30 games, while also leading the league in goals with 23, four more than teammate Chloe Goofers. There was a two-way tie for most goalie wins this season with Edmonton’s Mackenzie Gould-Sharpe and Red Deer’s Olivia Davidson both registering 12 victories. Edmonton’s Ella Dunham-Fox was the league leader in both goals-against-average (1.14) and save percentage (.944).
Both series are best-of-three. Matchups are as follows:
Provincial Qualifier Series A
Calgary Fire vs Rocky Mountain Raiders
Provincial Qualifier Series B
St. Albert Raiders Slash vs Lloydminster PWM Steelers
For complete schedules and links to the FloHockey broadcasts, check out the Playoffs tab on the U18 AAA website.