The atom Thunder got their first chance to take their game on the road last weekend, heading down to Merritt to test their mettle against southern teams.
The Quesnel team ended up fourth out of eight teams, coming out of the weekend with a 1-3-1 record.
”It was great for us to see some of the teams from the Lower Mainland and Okanagan and see that we can compete with them," Gord Salmon, the team's coach, said.
The excitement over the team's first road trip bubbled pretty high in the team's first game against Chilliwack. All of that nervous energy, plus the long travel before their first game caused the team to not quite meet their own standards of play, Salmon said.
Despite this, the team was able to keep up with the Chilliwack team, clinching a 10-10 tie.
After a rest Friday night to recuperate and calm the team down, the Thunder lit out to take on North Vancouver, Saturday morning.
"It was a much better effort on our part as the kids played a good game," Salmon said.
With the upgrade in play came an upgraded result, a 6-4 finish in favour of the Thunder.
In the evening, the Thunder faced Merritt, a very strong team backed by the hometown crowd.
Early on in the game, the Thunder lost three goals and found recovery impossible.
The Thunder never gave up, but with bounces that just wouldn't go their way, the team kept falling behind, Salmon. said
By the end of the game the gap had grown, ending with Merritt taking the game 13-3.
The Thunder's record, with a win, a lose and a tie, was good enough for second in their pool, which pitted them against North Vancouver A2 in the semi-finals.
"The game was back and forth the whole way," Salmon said.
The back and forth of the game was hampered by four disallowed goals. Despite the setbacks, the team continued to push, Salmon said.
Unfortunately, the Thunder couldn't come back from the disallowed goals, falling to the North Vancouver teams 10-7.
Their loss pushed the team into the bronze medal battle against Abbottsford.
"This was probably the best game of the weekend for us," Salmon said.
"It was back and forth with solid goaltending for each team."
The Thunder racked up a lot of chances, but didn't capitalize enough, thus falling to Abbottsford 5-3, to take fourth.
"It’s good to win and lose as a team and hopefully we all learned something this weekend that will help us down the road," Salmon summed it up.