4 days ago
The puck stops here
Lydia Hortop-Blair in action for the Dunedin Thunder. PHOTO: KEAPHOTOS
Four teams, three medals, two finals, one big winner.
Dunedin will be abuzz with ice hockey fever again as the New Zealand women's ice hockey league finals series skates into town this weekend.
It will be a big couple of days at the Dunedin Ice Stadium with all four teams in the hunt for the Goulding Cup. After the national women's league had a revamp this year, the competition was extended from six round robin games to 12 - but it all comes down to this weekend.
The Auckland Steel are hunting for a three-peat after being back-to-back champions. They head into the final series as the top seed, finishing the regular season with seven wins for 23 points.
Wakatipu Wild have been hot on their heels all season, wrapping up as second seed with seven wins for 22 points.
Canterbury Inferno are third with four wins for 18 points and Dunedin Thunder fourth with three wins for nine points.
But finals are a different beast, where anything can happen and fans in Dunedin - which hosted the men's and women's division 2, group B world championships earlier this year - will be out in force to help get the Thunder over the line.
Auckland will meet Dunedin in the first semifinal tomorrow afternoon, followed by Wakatipu coming up against Canterbury.
The winners of the semifinals advance to the gold medal final scheduled for Sunday night, while the losers will meet in the bronze medal playoff on Sunday afternoon.
Wakatipu Wild's Kellye Nelson is having another brilliant season and leads from the front for the Queenstown side. She leads the league with 12 goals and 13 assists, but Auckland Steel's Anjali Mulari has been close behind with 11 goals.
French import Lea Mullender has made her mark with the Dunedin Thunder and leads them with seven goals.
The puck drops for the first semifinal at 4pm tomorrow.
