The Alberta Junior Hockey League’s scoring race ended in a tie between Bryce Williamson of the St. Albert Steel and Zahn Raubenheimer of the Grande Prairie Storm.
“I wished I could’ve beat him,” said Williamson, after recording his 107th point of the season in Sunday’s 7-2 loss to the Fort McMurray Oil Barons at Performance Arena. “It just sucks that I tied.”
The last co-winners of the Ernie Love Trophy as the AJHL’s top scorers were Dana Lattery of the Olds Grizzlys and Riley Riddell of the Camrose Kodiaks with 108 points apiece in 1999/00.
Williamson completed his fourth and final AJHL campaign with 41 goals and 66 points in 60 games. Raubenheimer scored a league-high 47 goals and added 60 assists in 60 games.
“It’s been a great year. I’m happy with how I did,” said Williamson, who set Steel records for the most goals, assists and points in a season. “I can’t stress enough how much my linemates helped me out. I played with good linemates all year with [Reed] Linaker and [Alex] Perkins and Dan Carr when he was with us. All those guys always looked out for me.”
Going into the last weekend of the season the 20-year-old all-star right-winger from Seba Beach had 102 points, one more than Raubenheimer, with two games remaining for both teams. In Friday’s 6-3 win over the Oil Barons in St. Albert, Williamson tallied once and added three assists. Raubenheimer, 20, collected two assists in Friday’s 4-1 win over the last-place Drayton Valley Thunder. The next night against the Thunder he was credited with two goals and two assists in the 7-1 blowout to take the lead by a point.
With the first league scoring title of his career hanging in the balance Sunday, Williamson had tons of chances to pick up points but only managed an assist on Linaker’s goal on the power play 37 seconds into the third. His low shot from the slot was kicked out by goaltender Joey Quattrocchi but Linaker cashed in the rebound for the Steel’s first goal of the game.
“I just wanted to play like I had been all year and let the rest kind of handle itself,” said Williamson, the AJHL’s player of the week with one goal and seven assists in three games.
With 13 minutes to play the former Fort Saskatchewan Trader was robbed by Quattrocchi, who stopped a hard shot in close with his right pad.
“Willy had chances to bury today,” Linaker said. “I know I missed a couple too so it’s obviously really disappointing for him but as a linemate it’s also disappointing too that I couldn’t get him more points.”
Despite some power play time as the period wound down, Williamson was unable to register that extra point. With the game a done deal, the Steel even pulled their goalie for the extra attacker in hopes of giving their most valuable player an extra boost offensively.
“It was kind of frustrating. It just felt like it was so hard to get. Everything would go wrong so you couldn’t get it,” said Williamson, the Steel’s top scorer in three consecutive seasons. “It was almost like trying to score your first goal or getting your first point again.”
Sunday’s assist was his 250th point in 224 AJHL games. It also extended his point-scoring streak to 21 games (15 goals and 26 assists).
The franchise leader in games played (179), goals (102), assists (136), points (238), power play goals (44) and game winners (13) is also the Steel’s leading playoff point producer with 10 in nine games. If the Steel are to win their first playoff series in team history, the lanky forward with the happy-go-lucky grin will have to light up the Oil Barons in the upcoming best-of-five confrontation.
“We’re definitely the underdogs,” said the midget AAA product of the Maple Leaf Athletic Club. “They’re a good hockey team. We only beat them once this year [in six games] so to beat them three out of five games in the playoffs will be really tough for us. I just hope we’re up for the task.”
The Steel looked like a team that threw in the towel Sunday as the Oil Barons bombarded the home team with 55 shots. The margin after two periods was 42-12 for a 3-0 lead. Three of their seven goals were scored on the power play as referee Jonathan Spurgeon awarded 12 power plays to the Oil Barons, compared to eight for the Steel.
“There were a couple of questionable calls out there. They were a little bit better on the power play and we weren’t as good on our penalty kill. They just basically outplayed us today,” said Williamson, who will skate for the Bowling Green State University Falcons in the Central Collegiate Hockey Association next season.
