Quesnel Kangaroos claim CIHL championship, sweep Terrace River Kings in league final

The Quesnel Kangaroos are the 2019-20 CIHL Champions
Up next for the Roos and Terrace River Kings is the
2020 Coy Cup set for the end of this month

The Quesnel Kangaroos hopped to the top of the CIHL pile this past weekend, sweeping their Best of Three league final with an Overtime victory over the Terrace River Kings, claiming the Championship Saturday night at the Terrace Ice Arena.

The Kangaroos and River Kings battled it out in a thriller in the Skeena Valley, a hard hitting, sometimes quite physical match up that saw both teams assessed 62 minutes of penalty time combined the visiting Quesnel squad taking the bulk of the time in the penalty box.

That did not impact on their ability to score though, with the first half of the game an all Quesnel affair, the Kangaroos scoring all three of their regular time goals in the first period, with all the physical play in the second there wasn't apparently much time left over for scoring as neither team found a net in the middle frame.

The Third period push was all from the Terrace end, as the River Kings stormed back to tie the game  by the midway point of the final period of regular time, sending the two teams to extra time, something Quesnel made quick work of, picking up their series winning goal thirty four seconds into the OT to claim the 4-3 victory.

The win came on the heels of their Game One victory of a week before when they dominated the play and the scoreboard winning taking game one 8-4.

While coming up short for a chance for the league title, the River Kings can still make some noise this hockey season, with Quesnel hosting the Coy Cup this year, the CIHL spot in the Senior Men's championship tourney goes to the Terrace team, giving them a chance to bring the Cup to the northwest come the end of this month.

Terrace gained their berth in the CIHL final after their semi-final victory over the Prince Rupert Rampage in February, a hard fought battled that brought the Rhino's season to an end a little earlier than Rampage fans had hoped for.

As for the Coy Cup, the first game is set for Tuesday, March 24th; with the finals set for Saturday night March 28th at the West Fraser Centre in Quesnel.

Taking part in the 2020 Coy Cup are the host Kangaroos, the CIHL's River Kings, Kelowna Sparta and the Dawson Creek Canucks.

The full schedule for the 2020 Provincial Men's Senior AA Championship can be reviewed below:

As the teams prepare for their final skates of 2020, we'll keep an eye on the news streams for notes of interest from the Coy Cup tournament, you can find those notes from our Coy Cup archive here.

 For further items related to Senior men's hockey in BC see our our CIHL archive page here.