The Greater Sudbury Cubs are clearly creatures of habit.
In completing their three-peat in the NOJHL (Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League) with a 3-2 win over the Timmins Rock, the Cubs not only reeled off a 12th straight playoff victory in 2026 but managed to close out their sweep in the championship final in exactly the same manner as game four of the semis: with an overtime win on the road.
This time around, it would be veteran Kaedyn Long who would officially book the Cubs' ticket to the Centennial Cup, converting passes from Caden Dubreuil and Spencer Horgan at 15:35 of the first overtime period.
Despite facing daunting odds down 3-0 in the series, Timmins gave Sudbury everything they could handle, tied at 1-1 after twenty minutes of play as Briir Long (Cubs) and Maxx Hamelin (Rock) traded tallies.
A scoreless middle stanza gave way to all sorts of excitement in the third as Noah Kohan put Sudbury ahead (6:22), Ryan Armitage drew Timmins even (8:57) and goaltender Frédéric Cousineau sent the hometown crowd into a frenzy, turning aside a Mason Walker penalty shot attempt with 27 seconds remaining in regulation time.
Over and above the consolation that came via his team's ultimate triumph less than an hour later, Mason Walker was further delighted, recognized as the Playoff MVP, racking up 27 points in a dozen games.
In fact, Walker and pretty much constant linemate Briir Long finished second and third in playoff scoring, just behind Hamelin, with Grant Booth joining the deadly duo in inflicting much of the damage in the final.
"That line kind of emerged just after Grant (a late season signing) came over," said Walker, a ninth round pick of the Sudbury Wolves in 2024. "We had played with Nolan (Newton) for a bit but he went down and we needed to fill a spot - and he (Booth) fit in well."
"He's a great two-way player, he can win faceoffs and battles. All of us understand what we need to do to make the line work. Grant was saying that he's big on getting the puck in our hands. He gets it to us in really good positions where we can be successful."
Not part of the 2023-2024 banner winning team (though older brother Cameron was), Walker was a member of the squad that advanced to the playoff round of the national championships in Calgary last year.
"We have a really tight group this year, but I think that having that experience of having won before, knowing the adversity we would have to face," stated the speedy 17 year old forward. "We also have a very deep lineup."
"People are contributing from line one to line four, which then makes it easier on everyone."
In his mind, it also played a part in a statistical anomaly which saw the Cubs badly outscore their playoff opponents in the final twenty minutes of play, with the numbers in periods one and two much more closely matched.
"The first two periods, we could kind of wear them down and in the third period, we just knew that we had them," said Walker. "There's only so much that teams can do when you're facing three full periods of four lines coming at you."
The Cubs will enjoy some time to work on details in practice before heading off to Summerside (P.E.I.), site of the 2026 Centennial Cup as Sudbury actually opens the tournament with a game against the Ontario Junior Hockey League representatives (Toronto Patriots vs Newmarket Hurricanes) on May 7th at noon.
Still with the OJHL, it was interesting to note that Copper Cliff Reds product Atom Thususka enjoyed a highly productive year with the Collingwood Blues. The 2006-born talent registered 45 points (23G + 22A) in 54 games with the team this year.
