Alberta Red staged a wild comeback to punch their ticket to the Alberta Cup Final.
Facing off against the undefeated Alberta Black in their last round-robin game, Red fell behind 3-1 midway through the second period.
Oasiz Wiesblatt kick-started the ferocious comeback, as Red scored four unanswered goals in the final 26 minutes of the game to knock off Black 6-3.
Six different players hit the scoresheet for Red, with Connor Gourley, Liam Watkins, Logan Ziegler, Kaiden Wiltsie and Nicholas Wolfenberg all collecting goals.
Red Deer’s Nolan Larson opened the scoring for Black in the first and Ty Daneault gave them a 2-1 lead with a snipe shorthanded.
Tanner Scott extended the lead at 7:40 of the second before the wheels fell off for black. Back-to-back rebound goals five minutes apart for Red tied the game at three after 40 minutes.
Ziegler buried the go-ahead goal, before Gourley found the mark and Watkins closed out the scoring with a power play tally at 12:41.
Scott was player of the game for Black and Samuel Huck won the award for Red.
The win pushed Red into first place at the conclusion of round robin and Black won the tiebreaker over Alberta Green to earn its way into the final Sunday afternoon.
Green did all they could in the early game, knocking off Alberta Yellow 8-3. Green will play Yellow in the third-place game Sunday morning.
In the final round robin game of the tournament, Red Deer Bantam AAA Rebels player Nash Bamford scored twice to lead Alberta Blue to a 4-2 victory over Alberta Grey. It was the first win of the week for Blue.
Red Deer’s Tyler MacKenzie also scored in the win for Blue, while Innisfail’s Cole Fox had an assist.
Blue will play Grey in the fifth-place game Sunday morning.