Midway through the All Ontario U13 AAA Hockey Championships in Sudbury last week, the Barrie U13 AAA Colts were sitting with a middle of the road record of 2-2-0.

Losses to both the North Bay Trappers (7-3) and Ottawa Valley Titans (6-1) were offset by victories over the Chatham-Kent Cyclones (2-0) and Vaughan Kings (4-2).

Thankfully, the Colts would close out preliminary round play by taking care of business against both the Sudbury Wolves (9-1) and Thunder Bay Kings (7-0), setting the stage for Sunday playoff action with revenge on their minds.

“I’ve always said that this team never fails to rise to the occasion,” noted Barrie head coach Blair Sherrit, a one-time member of the Laurentian Voyageurs hockey team (1997-2000). “We lost to two really good teams in round robin. We managed to play them again on Sunday and our response was fantastic.”

“That’s what I was pleased with the most.”

A hat trick from Liam Crump lifted Barrie past the Titans in the morning encounter (4-2) and the Colts would duplicate that effort in the final, doubling the North Bay Trappers by that same score.

Avery Sherrit, Andrew Martins and Ryan Robbins (empty-net) all scored their first goals of the week in the gold medal game, with Luke Kanyo opening the scoring for Barrie while defencemen Jordan Adekoya and Sawyer Gedanitz scored for North Bay.

“We’ve always been a run and gun high offense team,” noted Sherrit, just completing his fourth year with this core. “But this last year or two, we’ve really started to work on our defensive game, to try and make sure the boys have a good 200 foot game.”

“But I would say that our identity is definitely offense, no question.

The U13 AAA Wolves finished the week at 1-5-0, a win over the Thunder Bay Kings providing the highlight for the local lads and staff.