CORNWALL, Ont. - The Oakville Blades had their playoff hopes quickly dashed last night at the RBC Cup junior A national hockey championship.
The unbeaten Camrose Kodiaks (Alta.), who rested players including goalie Allen York and Canadian junior A player of the year Joe Colborne, scored three short-handed goals in just under eight minutes in the second period and went on to drub the Blades (Ont.) 6-1 on Thursday.
The loss eliminated Oakville (1-3) at the five-team, round-robin tournament. Camrose, the nation's top-ranked team, goes 4-0 at the event and will play the 4th-seed Weeks Crushers (1-3) from north-central Nova Scotia in Saturday's 2 p.m. semifinal.
Saskatchewan's Humboldt Broncos (2-2) finished in second spot after a 4-1 win over Weeks earlier Thursday. The Broncos will play the host Cornwall Colts (2-2) on Saturday at 7 p.m., with the winners advancing to Sunday's 1 p.m. championship game.
Calgary's Jesse Todd scored two of the short-handed goals, at 7:52 to snap a 1-1 tie and at 13:58, and he set up Mike Connolly for another shorty at 15:42 to push the Camrose lead to 4-1.
David Jacobsen made it 5-1 before the period was over. Andre Herman had the Kodiaks' first-period goal, and he added a second goal in the third period.
Nick McParland, a 10-goal scorer in four games at the Dudley Hewitt Cup in Newmarket two weeks ago, scored his first goal in four games at Cornwall 3:33 into the second period to tie the score 1-1.
Earlier Thursday, Steven Schroeder scored two goals as the Broncos dominated the Crushers.
The win halted a two-game losing streak for Humboldt, who go into the playoffs as the second seed.
The Broncos outshot the Crushers 20-10 in the first period, which still ended 1-1. Humboldt got some breathing room early in the second period with a quick strike for two goals. Mitchell Stretch's shot went in just 37 seconds into the period, and Schroeder connected 52 seconds later at 1:29.
Matthew Kirzinger's goal from a sharp angle just beside the net at 16:41 pushed the lead to 4-1.
Schroeder had opened the scoring at 11:56 of the opening period, but the Crushers tied it at 16:39 on captain Scott Lavigne's power-play marker.