The Squamish Bald Eagles went 1-1-1 at a tournament in Victoria last weekend, but it wasn't enough to send them to the finals.
"We came very close to advancing, but we didn't," said Gregg Van Hierden, the president of the Old Timers League. "We didn't put the puck in the net when we should have."
Players from the over-35 league make up the Squamish Bald Eagles team, which plays at several tournaments during the year. Although historically the team has done well at the tournament, it couldn't pull together the win at the Pacific Cup from Jan. 14 to 16 this year.
The tournament started off with a solid 5-1 win against the Whistler Winter Hawks.
"We played well," said Rheaume Lacoursiere, who organizes the team for tournaments. "The were a little short."
It was a flashback for the two teams. Years ago, members of what is now the Whistler 35 plus team played in the men's league in Squamish before the Whistler rink was built. Players on both teams had faced each other before.
"It was good. It's like an alumni team," Lacoursiere said. He said the Whistler team often used to win the men's league title.
The next morning the Bald Eagles faced Port Alberni.
"We should have beat them this year," Lacoursiere said. "The bottom line is we didn't."
The Bald Eagles lead the scoring 2-1, but the Island team had a lucky goal when the puck hit the Eagles' goalie's arm and went in. The final score was 2-2.
Lacoursiere said some of the Bald Eagles' goals had been called back because of a high stick and because the net came off the moorings.
The local team faced the Coquitlam Ambassadors in the last match.
"They were as good as us," Lacoursiere said. "It was one of the closer games."
The score was tied at 3 apiece when the Bald Eagles pulled their goalie."We had to beat the team we lost against," Lacoursiere said. "A tie didn't do us any good." So with four seconds left, the Coquitlam team put the puck in the empty net, ending the match with a 4-3 victory.
"We outskated them," Van Hierden said. "We're a very good skating team."
It's not a shallow boast. "We were first in our division last year," he said.
In 2000, the team beat a Norway team in a shootout at the World Cup, winning the title, but in 2004 in Ottawa it was knocked out of the event by a Russian team.
Up next for the Bald Eagles are the Western Regionals in North Vancouver starting March 11.
"Potentially we could win that, but that remains to be seen," Lacoursiere said.
