And the dream remains alive.
Facing a must win in their drive for the Royal Bank Cup the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League champion Yorkton Terriers came up with a 3-1 win over Carlton Place in round robin action Wednesday.
Facing elimination the Terriers out shot the Canadians 16-8 in the first period but found themselves down a goal giving up a short-handed effort to Anthony McVeigh who completed a two-on-one break out going high to Terrier netminder Kale Thomson's glove side. The goal came at 9:36 of the period.
The Terriers finally equalized things when Brett Boehm scored a power play goal at 9:54 of the second.
Tayler Thompson scored what would be the eventual game-winner for Yorkton at 13:50.
The Terriers carried the 2-1 lead into the third where Chase Norrish, Player of the Game for Yorkton, would get an insurance goal in the power play at 6:04.
Thomson would get the win the Terrier net facing 26 shots, while his teammates generated 37 at Carlton Place netminder Guillaume Therien.
Terrier head coach Trent Cassan said it was important for Thomson to have a big game.
"He knew he needed to be better," he said of his netminder, adding Thomson has responded to adversity all year. "For us to bounce back here he needs to be one of our best players."
Cassan said the win was one the team can build on.
"It was the first time we put together a consistent effort," he said, adding that there is still room to fine tune. "The first 10-minutes we were a little nervous and gave up the first goal," he said. "But, after that we started doing the things we needed to do to be successful
"We played an honest game tonight."
Chase Norrish said the Terriers finally put together a "Terrier effort."
"It took us a little while to get going (in the tourney), but we knew coming into this one it was do, or die," he said.
Asked if giving up the first goal was worrisome for a team struggling to get traction in Vernon, Norrish said no one wants to give up the first goal, but it has happened before and it's something a good team has to overcome.
"We just stayed focused on our game. We listened to what the coach had to tell us," he said. " We played Terrier hockey."
The message was pretty straight forward, play a complete game of 60-minutes.
In the defensive end the hard work meant limiting Carleton Place's chances.
"We tried to keep pucks away," said Norrish, adding they boxed out the Canadians as much as possible.
Cassan said another message was to stay out of the penalty box in the final period.
"We talked about not taking penalties in the third period, and we did that," he said, adding while you need to play on the edge, at this level snipers have the extra room to be dangerous.
Offensively the Terriers generated lots of shots, and Norrish said when they got up 2-1 they gained some confidence.
"You know it's not a sure thing," he said, but there was a feeling the Terriers were in control for the first time in the RBC.
Thursday afternoon the Terriers will face another must-win contest. They defeat Dauphin and make the playoff round Saturday, or they lose and are the lone team left on the outside looking in.
The Terriers defeated the Kings twice at the Western Canada Cup, but Dauphin is 3-0 at this week's RBC.
"Dauphin has played very well in this tournament," said Cassan, adding in the WCC the game with the Terriers were "back and forth" affairs.
Norrish the Kings "are an excellent hockey club," but they at least are familiar with the way Dauphin plays.
And, again the Terriers have to win, which is huge motivation, he added.
"We've just got to keep playing hockey the way we know we can," said Norrish.
