Guelph Storm season ends by Tony Saxon
Once the Guelph Storm was awarded the Memorial Cup in November, the rest of the season became about preparing for next year. Now it’s official.
The Storm’s season came to an end Thursday night at the Sleeman Centre as the Windsor Spitfires capped off a four-game sweep of their opening round playoff series with an 11-3 win.
Guelph entered the season as a team with its eyes on finishing in the top four of the conference and earning home ice advantage.
But once they were guaranteed a spot in next season’s Memorial Cup, it became about making moves focused on next season, not this one. And as four teams above them in the standings all added older, talented and more experienced players, Guelph stuck to its guns, hoping to develop those who would be back next season and trading top players who wouldn’t.
It was going to take a bit of a miracle to get out of the first round against a very good Windsor team.
All but one player, overager Ethan Miedema, is eligible to return for Guelph next season and the draft pick piggy bank is overflowing, giving them plenty of assets to acquire the type of players Windsor and other teams picked up this season.
They played well in spurts this season, a couple of four-game winning streaks, a stretch where they won seven of nine, but as the season sore on and top players were traded, it became harder to compete with the top clubs.
“It was a lot. When Jetter (Jett Luchanko) and C-Paq (Charlie Paquette) got traded, both captains, it hurts the room. But we have a good group in there, we stuck together and we battled,” said Storm defenceman Grant Spada.
Written by Tony Saxon for GuelphToday.com
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