THE CENTURY MARK

The Balmoral Hall Blazers held a party recently. This one didn’t celebrate a tournament win or another Junior Women’s Hockey League championship. This one was held to honour two players – Sara Manness and Morgan Smith – the second and third players in BH history to score 100 points in a season and the first since Ryleigh Houston did it nearly a decade ago. “Sara, a Grade 10 student, got her 100th point in her 37th game this season,” said BH coach Sarah Zacharias. “Morgan in her 45th. Most players won’t hit 100 points in a four-year career. These two did it in just over half a season. On Feb. 23, we held a 100-point party. They were definitely deserving of a special honour.” Sara Manness can only be called a phenom. In fact, she came out of the Winnipeg Monarchs AAA program and has been the talk of women’s hockey in Western Canada for quite some time. “Sara is a great player to talk about and an easy player to talk about,” said Zacharias. “We call her ‘Big Man.’ When she’s out there, she’s noticeable every single shift. She’s a 200-foot player. She’s solid in the defensive zone, she’s always in the right position and what I love most about her is that she always makes the right play. There is not a selfish bone in her body. She was the leading scorer on our team in Grade 9. I can only imagine what she’s going to accomplish.” Manness started playing boys’ hockey with the Corydon Comets and played boys’ hockey until she was 14. She played with her twin sister, Kate (a defender), and both of them made the AAA boys’ Monarchs. They both switched to girls’ hockey when they entered BH last year and they have both been outstanding. It seems there was no doubt that she’d reach the 100-point plateau this season. “It was my goal from the beginning of the season,” Sara said. “Every shift I got out there, I wanted to create chances and scoring opportunities the best I could. I wasn’t going to stop until we got the goal. I set a goal to get an average of three points per game.” So why was she so successful? “I had really good linemates,” she said. “I loved playing with Hayley (McDonald) and Morgan (Smith). Me and Mo had a lot of chemistry. We got a lot of points as a line. I think I got 130 points, almost three points a game.” Smith, meanwhile, had 46 goals and 107 points in her first 49 games. A 17-year-old Grade 11 student who started playing in Springfield when she was four, she will graduate next season and then attend Bemidji State University in the fall of 2024. “Morgan is arguably the strongest 2024 grad in Manitoba,” said Coach Zach. “She may be young on this team, but she doesn’t play young. Physical, smart, tenacious and hungry, Mo has every tool a hockey player could want.” Smith, who joined Manness on Team Manitoba at the 2023 Canada Winter Games, agreed with Manness about their big line. All three will be back next year and that will be scary. “I was successful this year because of my linemates,” said Smith, bluntly. “Playing with Sara (Manness) and Hayley (McDonald) was perfect. Nobody cared who scored the goal, just as long as we scored and won the game. By playing unselfishly, you just get more points. If Sara scored, I assisted. If I scored, Sara assisted. “It was just a really fun year.”