The Predators outscored their opponents 82-30 during the entire Western Canadian tournament. Five members of the Prince Albert Predators received individual honours. (Prince Albert Raiders Lacrosse Team/Facebook.)

By Nick Nielsen

Undefeated season for Jr. Lacrosse

Prince Albert Predators Western Canadian champions

Aug 12, 2024 | 3:20 PM

Two years, two provincial championships, and now you can add Western Canadian Champions to the list of accolades for the Prince Albert Predators Lacrosse team.

After a perfect regular season, the Predators headed to Brooks, Alberta where they played four round robin games against teams from Calgary, Swift Current, the Lakeland Heat out of Bonnyville, Alta. and the Southern Alberta Lacrosse team based out of Taber, Alta.

The tournament started off on the perfect note according to Head Coach and GM Lucas Wells. In their 16-1 win over the Calgary Wranglers, the Predators only goal against came in the first quarter before they shut things down for the next three.

“I thought the entire tournament we played just kind of our brand of lacrosse.”

Through the the rest of the round robin stage, the Predators continued to steamroll their opponents with an 11-8 win over the Swift Current Wolverines, an 11-4 win over the Lakeland Heat, and finally a 16-10 win over the hosting Southern Alberta Chaos.

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According to Wells, it was after their game against Lakeland that the Predators knew they had something special going towards a championship.

“Lakeland had won Alberta provincials about a week before our first game against each other and that was also another what I would consider a statement game where we kind of just smothered them, smothered their offence and kind of just took complete control of the game.”

In their semi final game, the Predators were tasked with taking on Southern Alberta once again, and again the Predators put up 16 goals on their way to a 16-4 win. The Predators met the Lakeland Heat one last time in the final where they took a dominant 12-3 win for the gold medal.

“It starts with the leadership, with our Captain Davin Ikert and the other graduating players, guys like Hayden Ulrikson and Chase Ulrikson, Caidyn Prediger up front and then on the back end with like I said with Davin, Kade Beaton, Zach Lysitza. It’s just the leadership and their ability to know that we’ve they’ve been here before, settle in, and we’ll play our game and everything is going to work out. They don’t need to get fired up and over excited and make mistakes in certain situations. It was a very impressive year and a very impressive graduating class,” Wells said.

Five members of the Prince Albert Predators received individual honours. (Prince Albert Raiders Lacrosse Team/Facebook.)

A number of Predators players will also be coming home with individual accolades to their name. Brayden Reiger of the Predators lead the tournament in goals, assists, and points with 19-13-32 in total from playoffs and round robin, earning tournament MVP honours. Matthew Cudmore finished second in the offensive categories with 12-14-26, earning the Top Offensive player award.

Team captain Davin Ikert was also named to the first team all stars, while Sam Cooper and goaltender Mason Hawkes were named to the second team all stars. Hawkes was named to the second team all star team despite finishing with a tournament best 0.871 save percentage through both playoffs and round robin.

“Mason Hawkes, he’s the best goalie in the problems in his age group, in any age group I think, and that’s going to be a major loss for us.”

For Wells, this graduating class is going to be a tough one to watch move on. Between two provincial championships and now Western Canada championships, they have had a lot to celebrate as a team, but it’s the personalities on the team that have made them so successful.

“When you go to our captain Davin Ikert, he’s that calm steady presence but can be a can be a dog, and he’s got that calming presence on the bench. He’s my communicator talking to officials, so that’s that’ll be a big loss. Then you’ve got Kade Beaton. He lives and breathes Predator lacrosse and he was texting me all winter saying he can’t wait to get back to P.A. and play.”

Wells continued, “Zach Lysitzka, Zach picked up lacrosse again a couple years ago and he fit in well and he improved and worked his bag off and he’s another one of those calm, quiet presences that we’re going to miss. Then we got Chase Ulriksen as well and his brother, Hayden Ulriksen. Hayden and Chase were the bangers for us and setting screens on the offence and being able to play defence if we needed. The versatility between those two was incredible.”

Not to be left out, Wells had praises for his final graduating player Caidyn Prediger.

“He was our crease guy and he was once again one of one of those common presences. So our graduating class is a large one this year but it is exciting and I’ll look into the future. I guess you could say with all the young talent now coming up and that’s trying to be able to replace those seven key players.”

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Nick.Nielsen@pattisonmedia.com