Tag: championship

Saginaw Spirit – 2024 Memorial Cup Champions

Nick MomrikLeave a comment

Saginaw hosted the 2024 Memorial Cup and we were lucky to have tickets for the Championship game on Sunday night.

The Memorial Cup is the national championship of the Canadian Hockey League (CHL), a consortium of three major junior ice hockey leagues operating in Canada and parts of the United States. It is a four-team round-robin tournament played among the champions of the Ontario Hockey League (OHL), Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League (QMJHL) and Western Hockey League (WHL), and a host team, which alternates on an annual basis between the three member leagues.

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The Memorial Cup is sometimes referred to as one of the hardest championships to win in hockey, factoring in the number of teams across the CHL’s member leagues nationwide, the Memorial Cup tournament being played between their top teams, and the limited eligibility period for players to compete at the major junior level.

Wikipedia

The Spirit held a 3-0 lead at one point and the London Knights tied it up in the third period. Then Saginaw scored the 4-3 game winner with 21 seconds left in the game. It was amazing!

The Spirit came to Saginaw in 2002 and this is the city’s first Memorial Cup. The CHL web site has a great game highlights video.

Magical Madness

Nick Momrik1 Comment

Last night #2 North Carolina beat top ranked Illinois 75-70 in the NCAA Championship game. UNC led by 13 at half and was up by as much as 15 in the 2nd half, but Illinois fought back to make for an exciting finish to the best March Madness in history.

Words can’t even describe how special it was watching college kids battle on the basketball court for the past three weeks. There’s nothing in sports quite like it. Every kid that plays basketball dreams about cutting down the nets someday. Very few will ever get the opportunity to make those dreams a reality. Each year in March we get to watch how much it really means to these kids. They aren’t playing for money or fame. They’re playing with heart, emotion, and lifelong goals as their motivation.

I won’t even go into it anymore than I have, because you either understand what I’m saying or you don’t. It really is a joy to watch.