The Arvada Hockey Association held their Winter Fest Tournament this past weekend, featuring teams from all over the western United States. It turned out to be a great success for the local teams, as both the Bantam A and Bantam B squads won their respective divisions, while the Pee Wee B team made it through to the semifinals.

The Bantam A's, coached by Richard Forman and featuring players ages 13-15, had the most exciting road to the championship, playing overtime thrillers in both the semifinal and final games. First, in the semis, they got past Colorado Hockey Club, 3-2, in a game that was settled by an overtime shootout. Zach Geiger scored the deciding penalty shot in the shootout after picking up a goal and an assist in regulation. Dayton Knutson banged in the other Arvada goal.

The championship game pitted Arvada against their mountain neighbors of Summit Hockey. Again, regulation play was not enough time to decide matters, and the two teams headed to overtime knotted at 1-1, with Knutson tallying the lone Arvada goal. But Geiger was clutch for his team once again, finding the back of the net just 39 seconds into the extra session.

Coached by Jeff Wiemelt, the Bantam B's had a much easier path to the final game. First, they hammered Sheridan Wyoming 9-0 in the semifinal, dominating play and outshooting their opponent by a 35-13 margin. Chris Lupinski had two goals and two assists, while Charles Joly chipped in with two goals and one assist. Goalie Ryan O'Connor turned aside all 13 shots to pick up the shutout.

The final was completely different against the Omaha Mavericks. After falling behind 3-1 at the end of the first period, Arvada roared back in the last two frames with four unanswered goals,culminating with an empty netter by Crosby Lee with 28 seconds remaining. The home side featured a balanced attack, with Ben Schwenk, Sean Teater, Callum Whyte, and Max Schwarz all knocking in single markers.

The Pee Wee B's (ages 11-12), guided by Keith Malazdrewicz, had their best tournament result of the season in getting through to the semifinals, before losing to eventual champion DU Major, 3-0. In their final pool play game, they battled back to tie Northern Colorado 2-2, on a goal by Conner Clark with just 2:18 left to play. They then won the tiebreaker against the same NCYH team to advance to bonus hockey for the first time this season.