The season is officially over for the Lakeland Eagles of the North Peace Hockey League after the team was roughed up 9-2 in game six of its best-of-seven Campbell Cup final April 1 against the Spirit River Rangers. Spirit River won back-to-back games to defeat Lakeland four games to two. The loss was a bitter pill to swallow for the Eagles, which made its second league final appearance in as many years. Lakeland also lost last year to the Peace River Stampeders.

The Lakeland Eagles have fallen short of their bid to hoist the North Peace Hockey League’s Campbell Cup championship for the second time in as many years. Lakeland, which faced a must-win situation in game six of their best-of-seven final with Spirit River last Thursday, was tarred and feathered by a superior Rangers team which lit the lamp nine times en route to a lopsided 9-2 win to claim the league championship. “We just didn’t do the little things we needed to do to be successful,” says Eagles co-coach Jimmy McLean. And it showed right from the get-go as a spirited Rangers team quickly built up a 3-0 first period lead before putting the game out of reach with four more in the second period for a commanding 7-0 edge after forty minutes of play. Spirit River continued its dominant play in the final 20 minutes by capitalizing on its third power-play goal of the game to make it 8-0. Lakeland’s only bright spot on offence came in the final six minutes of play when the Eagles spoiled Chad Rycroft’s shutout bid with a pair of power-play markers at 14:23 and the 18:08 mark Raymond Cunningham and Jay Anderson. The Rangers rounded out the scoring summary just 44 seconds at 18:52 when captain Faron Duthie notched his second goal in a game which saw the Eagles out-shot by a count of 50-23.