The Thunder Bay Sportop Queens will play for the Esso Cup Canadian National Female Midget Hockey Championship Saturday in Charlottetown, P.E.I.
Thunder Bay earned their way to the final by virtue of a 4-2 come from behind victory over the Halifax Metro Boston Pizza in semifinal action Friday.
They will now meet the Pembina Valley Hawks of Manitoba in the gold medal game, which can be seen on TSN at 4 p.m. ET. The Queens edged the Hawks 5-4 in round robin play Thursday handing them their only loss so far.
Pembina Valley squeaked by the Edmonton Thunder 2-1 in Friday’s other semifinal with Edmonton now meeting Halifax for bronze at noon ET Saturday.
In the Queens’ match-up, they stormed out of the gate carrying the play outshooting the Atlantic title holders 18-3 in first period, but could not solve the superb netminding of Stefanie Moak.
Buoyed by their goaltender, Halifax struck twice quickly in the middle frame to go up a pair on markers by Alyssa Palmer-Dixon and Breanna Lanceleve.
Ever-persistent, Thunder Bay finally solved Moak at the 6:18 mark of the second stanza thanks to a tally by Jessica Gazzola.
Special teams then saw the Queens tie it and eventually take the lead as they notched a couple of shorthanded efforts, 40 seconds apart, by Michela Cava and Gazzola, who netted her second of the night and tournament-leading 10th overall.
An all-important late goal put the Ontario midget champions up a pair after 40 minutes thanks to Cava’ finishing off the work of Brianna Iazzolino, who collected her second assist of the contest, at 19:23.
The final frame was scoreless as the game wrapped up with Megan Leikkari making 14 saves to record the win in net for Thunder Bay.
The Queens fired 46 shots on Moak, who earned player of the game laurels for Halifax while Iazzolino secured the nod for her side.
