Morning Star Staff
Trey Anderson pulled the hat trick as the Sooke Thunderbirds toppled the Fix Auto Vipers 6-5 Saturday morning in the Vernon Bantam Tier 3 Hockey Tournament at Civic Arena.
The Thunderbirds counted four third-period goals to stun the Vipers.
Lochlan O’Keefe recorded a deuce for Vernon, who got singles from Chris Bond, Ronac Chauhan and Cody Beckner. Liam Remple produced three helpers.
The Vernon coaches are: Brent Bond, Dwayne Remple, Scott Palfreyman, and Bruce Moore
The Vipers opened the eight-team tourney with a 4-1 loss to the Whitehorse Mustangs Friday afternoon.
Teja Sheldrake went the distance in net versus Whitehorse.
The Vipers started in the offensive zone in the beginning, but a quick breakaway counter put Whitehorse up 1-0 before they went up by a deuce on a powerplay.
Vernon forward-turned defenceman Jacob Green took a shot from the blue line and Chauhan was there for the tip 14 minutes into the second period.
Vernon held a shot advantage.
In other Friday action, the Merritt Cerntennials held off Sooke 3-1, the South Okanagan Devils grounded the Port Moody Panthers 5-3 and the West Kelowna Warriors and Windermere Valley Rockies battled to a 3-3 tie.
Sooke racked up 56 penalty minutes and had one player ejected from the tournament after an incident with an official.
The A final goes today at 12:45 p.m. at Civic Arena.
Meanwhile, the Vernon Authentic Trophy & Plaque Hawks blew a 2-0 lead and earned a 4-4 tie with the first-place Talon Benefits Thrashers in North Okanagan Midget Super League play Friday night at Priest Valley Arena.
Austin Moore pocketed a pair of snipes for the Hawks, who improved to 4-5-1. Nick Mann and Cody Webb, with the equalizer, on a powerplay with 2:55 remaining, also converted for the Hawks.
Michael Pusey, Tanner Wright, Brendan Horsfield and Dakota Becker connected for the Thrashers, who went to 7-0-3. Horsfield earned three assists.
Nick Maglio of the Hawks and Garrett Adams of the Thrashers were both stellar in net.