Two of the Lakehead Thunderwolves five opponents at the upcoming Cavendish University Cup CIS Men's Hockey Championships in Thunder Bay have been decided. The CIS No. 1 UNB Varsity Reds, last year's CIS silver medalists, and the No. 4 Saint Mary's Huskies booked their tickets to Thunder Bay by winning their respective AUS semi-final series.
UNB defeated Acadia 3-2 in OT Thursday night in Wolfville, Nova Scotia to sweep the series 3-0 while Saint Mary's defeated the No. 7 Moncton Aigles Bleues 4-3 in Moncton to take that series 3-1.
New Brunswick and Saint Mary's will now meet in the AUS Final (Best of Three) and both teams join host Lakehead as three of the six teams of the 2009 Cavendish University Cup field. The final three berths will go to the two OUA playoff finalists and the winner of Canada West.
No. 6 Western is leading No. 3 Laurier 1-0 in the OUA West best-of-two semi-final series while McGill is leading No. 5 UQTR 1-0 in the OUA East semifinals. The winners of both those series will also book a trip to Thunder Bay while there are six of seven Canada West teams still battling for the lone Canada West University Cup berth.
Lakehad split a pair of non-conference games with Saint Mary's at the beginning of this season (3-1 Lakehead, 2-0 St. Mary's) and the Wolves have an all time mark of 3-1 against the Huskies; all in non-conference action.
The Wolves are 1-3 against UNB all time; 1-2 in non-conference play and 0-1 in University Cup play in Fredericton in 2003. The last time the two squads met; UNB skated to a 5-3 victory on Dec. 31, 2004 in the championship final of the Thunderwolves Varsity Cup tournament.
Atlantic University Sport Semi-Finals (Best of Five)
Game 1 - Mar. 1: Acadia 2 at New Brunswick 5
Game 2 - Mar. 2: Acadia 0 at New Brunswick 1
Game 3 - Mar. 5: New Brunswick 3 at Acadia 2 OT
(New Brunswick wins best-of-five series 3-0.)
Game 1 - Feb. 25: Moncton 4 at Saint Mary's 5
Game 2 - Feb. 28: Moncton 2 at Saint Mary's 0
Game 3 - Mar. 3: Saint Mary's 4 at Moncton 3 (2 OT)
Game 4 - Mar. 10: Saint Mary's 4 at Moncton 3
(Saint Mary's wins best-of-five series 3-1.)