PBCN Stars captain Cody Michelle hoists the Senators Cup after defeating the Canoe Lake Young Guns, 9-2 on April 16, 2023. (Logan Lehmann/paNOW staff)

By Logan Lehmann

the stars align

PBCN Stars repeat as Senators Cup champions

Apr 17, 2023 | 12:54 AM

Winning a championship once is pretty sweet, but going back-to-back is even sweeter.

For the second straight year, the Peter Ballantyne Cree Nation (PBCN) Stars were crowned champions of the PAGC Senators Cup, defeating the Canoe Lake Young Guns 9-2 in the championship game.

The Stars came out on top beating out 15 other teams to hoist the Cup and win the $30,000 cash prize. PBCN captain Cody Michelle spoke with paNOW moments after winning where he said they couldn’t have done it without each other.

“We played simple hockey all weekend,” he said. “Pucks in, pucks out, we relied on each other, every guy.”

“We all come here to work together and our families all over Saskatchewan come to watch us play hockey, especially in a nice rink. Nice group, organization who put it on and we’re all happy and proud about that.”

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The PBCN Stars mob captain Cody Michelle after he opens the scoring in the Senators Cup finals. (Logan Lehmann/paNOW staff)

Michelle had the opening marker in the first period for the Stars to help his team gain momentum early. From there, the boys kept rolling and eventually found themselves out to a 3-0 lead after the opening frame.

The rest of the game was smooth sailing for PBCN, jumping out to a 6-2 lead after the second before scoring three more times in the third to induce the mercy rule on the Young Guns with 11:52 remaining in the final frame where Michelle scored the Cup-clinching goal.

The moment the PBCN Stars won it all. (Logan Lehmann/paNOW staff)

The Stars captain talked about how grueling the Senators Cup tournament can be, especially if you’re coming up through the losers bracket, and how hard you must fight to make the finals.

“Our main focus was to win every game,” he explained. “Like Canoe Lake, they played six games today and that’s because of their first loss on (Saturday). This isn’t our first time being here and we know what it takes to win. We’re going to be looking forward now to (Fred) Sasakamoose and next year as well.”

As for what’s next for the club, Michelle said that the team will be back in practice mode for the upcoming Fred Sasakamoose ‘Chief Thunderstick’ National Hockey Championship in Saskatoon next month. That tournament will host 40 men’s clubs as well as 16 women’s teams from across the country and gets underway on May 18th and will go until the 21st.

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logan.lehmann@pattisonmedia.com

Twitter: @lloganlehmann