Locals win regionals with Storm

It has been a bittersweet playoff run for Breeze Lahache, one of five Kahnawa’kehró:non playing for the regionals-winning Junior A Southwest Storm. They won the egionals on March 29 following a 3-1 win against the Westlake Wild.

Lahache’s last year of Junior eligibility ended in an unfortunate way for Lahache, as she broke her elbow falling on it during the first game of the Storm’s playoffs on March 16 – minutes after scoring the winning goal against the MRO Banshees in a 2-1 win.

“It feels really good to win because it’s my last year, but I’m also sad about it because I didn’t get to play because of my injury,” said Lahache, who finished the game against MRO but did not see the ice in any of the remaining games. “That’s really a sad thought, because it’s not how I wanted to end my career.”

Despite the end of her season, it was not the end of her time supporting the team. Indeed, she was given a spot behind the bench for the rest of the Storm’s run.

“My coach gave a little special announcement for me, because in the game, I continued playing with my fractured bone. He was saying that I sacrificed my body for my team to get us where we are. I think my team was really proud that I did all that, and that I still showed up, even with the injury,” said Lahache.

“She showed a lot of resilience and a lot of determination,” said Storm coach Marc Ikin.

“She scored a big goal prior to getting hurt and then finished the game out. She wanted to still encourage her team, even though she couldn’t play. I think that showed great team spirit. Even though she couldn’t play, she found ways to keep the team motivated, coming behind the bench, cheering, giving high fives.”

The Storm remained undefeated in their regionals run, with two wins and a tie prior to their finals match against the Wild.

The Storm put two on the board early in the game, and from there, they stayed in the driver’s seat.

“Our energy was really brought up, and we’re like, ‘oh my god, we could win this. We really have to keep it up and keep pushing until the end,’” said Lahache of the team’s mindset after those goals.

The Wild scored to get within one, but the Storm stayed in the lead and added the insurance goal to seal the deal.

“We were quite resilient. When we scored the third goal, from that point on, I felt like we really just carried the rest of the game,” said Ikin.

He said that after beating the Wild twice in the regular season in close games, they knew it would not be an easy path to the championship banner.

“I think we played a real team game. Everybody contributed in all of the ways they could. That was the difference for us,” said Ikin.

Both Ikin and Lahache said that the win came because of that teamwork and chemistry - which is even more notable as prior to the season, many of the players had not played with each other.

In fact, they were not even in the same association.

Lahache said that she had been playing since elite U13 hockey for Lac St. Louis, but a change in leadership prior to the season caused a change in geographical eligibility, meaning she could no longer play for that organization.

“I thought I was going to have to end hockey there, because I didn’t know any other Junior teams around,” said Lahache.

She did end up finding a team in Mercier, but they did not have enough players to have a season. That was the organization the four other Kahnawa’kehró:non on the team - Shyanna Day, Lexey Leclaire, Ava Standup, and Tewa White - played for.

To make sure there would actually be a season, that group of players merged with the Junior A Storm, which also did not have enough players to ice a team.

Going from playing with the same teammates for years to a whole new organization was a weird experience at first for Lahache, who wondered whether or not she would be able to gel with her new teammates, and whether the language barrier would be a factor, as the five players from Kahnawake were the only non-francophone players.

“We were still able to communicate and get along, which is pretty cool. I really liked it, I enjoyed my time with the Storm,” said Lahache.

“The fact that we were able to pull together players who had been some competitors beforehand, in previous seasons, come together, and they gelled pretty quickly. We had a huge stretch from the beginning of November to just after Christmas where we went undefeated,” said Ikin.

“It doesn’t always have to be perfect to start, but if you can stay together as a team and build some camaraderie, I think it shows what you can do at the end of the day.”

The next stop for the team is the Chevy Cup, coming this weekend in Quebec City.

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