Westmount wins St. Laurent hockey tournament

“This is the same tournament our Midget A team won last year, but this year it was our Atoms,” said Westmount Recreation’s Steve Robaire.

This year’s Atom team has been formidable, so Robaire was not surprised to see them not only win, but dominate.

“They actually didn’t lose a single game all tournament long, winning four in total, including the final,” he said.

“They opened with a 4-0 win over the Laval Express, followed up by a 4-0 win over the host St. Laurent Sonics, and then they beat the Verdun Blazers also 4-0 in the semi-final.

“The final was a very close game at the end of the first. We were up 2-1 at that point, but that by the end of the second we were up 5-2 and we took it from there,” Robaire said.

One Predator, he added, was particularly impressive in the championship game.

“One of our players, Eli Zuckerman, had four goals in the final, and Adam Leutner scored the first goal to get us going.”

These Atoms, Robaire said, are unusually good.

“They haven’t lost a game anywhere this year, and they’re 10-0 in their league and 14-0 if you include the tournament results (as of the the end of January),” he said.

“This is the first year we’ve had a travelling B-level team, and part of the success has been because they have great goaltending with Laurent Jolicoeur and Cedric Meyer.

“They split time and they’re equally as good as each other, it’s a real asset for this team.”

The Atom B squad may have been the only tournament winner, but two other local teams also performed well in St. Laurent.

“This year we had six teams in the tournament and we had three teams advance in the playoffs and the Preds win it all,” Robaire said.

“Our peewee and bantam A teams lost in the semi-finals.

The Bantams lost 5-3 in the semis to the Dollard Centennials. They played a strong game, but Dollard just got the best of them.

“Our Peewees also lost to Dollard, 2-1, so that shows that Dollard is also strong.”

The 2008 St. Laurent tournament-winning Atom B Predators are: David Elbaz, Alexandre Jasmin, Zachary Rosen, Louis Rivest, Adam Leutner, Liam Ross, Matthew Millot, Ryan O’Toole, Andreas Dionisopoulos, Charles-Antoine Desgreniers, Matthew Filgiano, Eli Zuckerman. They are coached by Alain Elbaz and Denis Jasmin.