Stittsville Steelers capture Cougar Cup

Posted Feb 2, 2012 By EMC News

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Courtesy of Samantha Mazur

Members of the Stittsville Bantam B2 Steelers, winners of the recent Hubert Seguin Cougar Cup tournament in Gloucester, are, front row, left to right, kneeling, John Morden, John Costanzo, Jack Laushway, Cameron McGetrick and goalie Jarred Mazur, second row, left to right, also kneeling, Teddy Beingessner, Alex Taylor, Justin Falcone, Dylan Woods, Justin Laframboise, captain Zack Gillis, Christian Rolston, Josh Hann and Daniel Pageau, and, back row, standing, left to right, assistant coach Tom Gillis, coach John McGetrick, assistant coach Phil Beingessner and trainer Paul Taylor. Missing from the picture are trainer Wendy Laframboise and manager Karen Falcone.

EMC Sports - The Hubert Seguin Cougar Cup has come to Stittsville.

Bringing home this trophy from the annual Hubert Seguin Cougar Cup tournament in Gloucester on the weekend of Jan. 13-15 was the Stittsville Bantam B2 Steelers team.

The Steelers not only went undefeated in capturing the Cougar Cup over 15 other teams but also won two of four events in a skills contest on the Saturday evening.

Winning the skaters' agility relay in the skills contest were the Steelers' entry of John Costanzo, Jack Laushway, Daniel Pageau, Christian Rolston, Zack Gillis, John Morden, Josh Hann and Alex Taylor.

Winning the skaters' team relay event were Zack Gillis, Justin Falcone, Justin Laframboise and Alex Taylor.

What makes this tournament special is not only the games and the skills contest but also an all-star game which is held following the skills contest. Justin Laframboise and Zack Gillis represented the Steelers in this all-star contest.

It was in the tournament games that the Steelers really showed their stuff as a team.

On the Friday evening, the Steelers took on the Blackburn Stingers in what turned out to be an entertaining but in the end scoreless game. Yes, that's right - it ended in a 0-0 tie. MVP of the game for the Steelers was Christian Rolston.

Early Saturday morning saw the Steelers take to the ice against the host Gloucester Cougars. No scoreless tie for the boys in this game. The Steelers scored early and ended up cruising to a 9-0 victory. John Costanzo was the MVP for the Steelers in this game.

In their third and final round robin game of the tournament, the Steelers fell behind 1-0 to the Cumberland Dukes but then exploded, scoring five goals on the way to a 5-2 win. Alex Taylor was the team's MVP in this game.

This record of two wins and a tie in round robin play meant that the Steelers moved on to the semi-finals, taking on a well known opponent, the Stittsville Bantam B4 team. The Steelers came out on top in this contest, winning 3-1, with Ted Beingessner honoured as the team's MVP in the game.

The Steelers then advanced to the championship final against the Ottawa Center team, another team undefeated in the tournament to that point.

Played at the Earl Armstrong Arena with the tournament's namesake Hubert Seguin in attendance, this championship final turned out to be quite a game. The Steelers took a 1-0 lead into the third period which saw the Ottawa Center squad buzzing all around the ice. Despite this, it was the Steelers who scored, giving them a 2-0 lead with only minutes left in the game. This is how the game ended, with the Steelers mobbing goalie Jarred Mazur in celebration of the championship win. Indeed, it was quite a tournament for Jarred Mazur in the Steelers' net, with three shutouts and only allowing three goals in total throughout the tournament. He was selected as the Steelers' MVP in the championship game.