Express Atoms win hometown tournament

October 6, 2016 · 0 Comments

By Jake Courtepatte

The York-Simcoe Express Atoms have proved they are the best of the best in AAA minor hockey, and on home ice to boot.
For the second time this early season, the Express beat the Kanata Blazers in a championship matchup to claim a tournament victory, this time in the first annual Steamtrain Tournament.
With games split between the Stronach Aurora Recreation Complex (SARC), and the La Brier Arena at St. Andrew’s College in Aurora, as well as Newmarket’s Ray Twinney complex, ten teams took part between the 2006 atom and 2007 minor atom divisions.
The atom Express opened on Friday with a 3 – 2 win in round robin play over the Blazers, highlighted by two goals from Jared Mcneil and a single from Nicholas Zamach.
They took down the Lambton Jr. Sting on the same day, a 5 – 2 score with goals from Cooper Vickerman, Cole Davis, Michael Denney, and a pair from Nate Brentnell.
The Express’ Saturday schedule started off with a bang, picking up a 10 – 3 victory over the Ajax-Pickering Raiders with six different Express players getting on the board. A shutout of the Kitchener Rangers set up a rematch with the Blazers in the Sunday final, where the Express rolled to a 6 – 2 victory with a pair of goals each from Denney and Brentnell, as well as tallies from Zamach and Antonio Cerqua.
The team is off to a 10-0-1 start to the season.
In the minor atom division, the Express took down both the Brantford 99ers and Lambton Jr. Sting in round robin play before bowing out to both the North Central Predators and Toronto Nationals to exit the tournament.
Lambton would go on to beat Toronto 6 – 5 in the final.