WINNING ESSO: THUNDER BAY QUEENS (2010), News (Thunder Bay Women's Hockey Association)

The Thunder Bay Queens won four of five preliminary round games to earn the top seed heading into the playoffs, where they avenged their lone defeat by edging the Edmonton Thunder 2-1 in the semifinals.

Just past the halfway point of the gold medal game, the Notre Dame Hounds built a 3-1 lead. With four minutes to play in the second the Queens’ deficit was down to one, and with just over two to play in the period Michela Cava cut to the net and tied things up. Kaitlyn Tougas – the tournament MVP – scored her second of the game with less than nine minutes to go in the third to give the Queens the only lead they would need.

Sibling revelry
Some sisterly intuition on the power play led to the game-winning goal. Courtney Tougas took a shot from the point, aiming not for the net but for her younger sister’s stick. Kaitlyn went five-hole with the redirect.  “I don’t think anything will ever come close to that again. I mean, maybe one day when we get married, but…,” says Kaitlyn, smiling, “I looked up to [my sister] all year playing with her. To end on that note together was pretty special.”

Close, but only a crossbar
As time was running out, the Hounds won a face-off in the offensive zone; the ensuing point shot bounced off at least one body and then off the crossbar. “The last minute and a half I don’t think I was able to watch,” says Cava, now a junior at the University of Minnesota Duluth. “I can’t even describe the feeling when we won – the chills running through your body. You work hard all year and the feeling was absolutely amazing. I still remember that to this day.”

Leaving her mark
Every player was individually introduced to come and receive her gold medal. Unfortunately, Tougas missed out, the newly-named Player of the Game being otherwise engaged doing an interview with TSN. She did eventually get her medal, but ended up leaving without some of her equipment. “The Hockey Hall of Fame stole my gloves and my stick, too,” she says, laughing. “I kind of left empty-handed.”

“I believe together we’ll fly”
As the team had wound down its regular season it had adopted the motto “I believe,” inspired by the Nikki Yanofsky song that had been on a continual loop a few weeks earlier during the 2010 Olympic Winter Games. “It was just to believe not only in your teammates but also in yourself,” says Tougas, now a junior at Bemidji State University. The words were on the back of their helmets and the song itself was played before every game. After Thunder Bay beat Notre Dame, the song received a post-game encore. “None of us wanted to take our jerseys off,” says Tougas. “We wanted to stay together and just share that moment for as long as we could before we got kicked out of there.”

Time to break up the party
One player missing from most of the post-game dressing room celebrations was Courtney Tougas. In the game’s closing seconds a Notre Dame player had fallen on her hand. “She had to take off right away,” says Kaitlyn Tougas. “She went to emergency to get an x-ray for her hand – it was swollen like a beach ball.”

Feted like queens
Sign-toting family and fans, as well as a handful of journalists, welcomed the team at the Thunder Bay airport the next day. “It was definitely a welcoming time,” says Tougas. “It made us feel proud that we brought home something special.”

www.hockeycanada.ca/en-ca/news/winning-esso-thunder-bay,-2010