AMHERST – The Ramblers held a team meeting Monday.
It wasn’t hard to find topics for discussion.
“This could be the last game of our careers, because some of us don’t know where or if we’ll be playing next year,” said captain Travis Turner, referring to tonight’s Game 6 of the Maritime Junior A Hockey League Bent Division championship against the Truro Bearcats at the Stadium at 7:30 p.m.
Amherst trails the best-of-seven series 3-2, and must win to force a seventh and deciding game in Truro on Thursday.
Seven Ramblers, including Turner, will graduate from the junior ranks this season.
“It was a good meeting, and I think we’ll have a good game (tonight) and pull out a win,” he added.
The Ramblers need to be the team that took Truro to overtime in Games 1 and 2 — winning Game 2 — and recorded a convincing 5-2 road victory in Game 3 to steal home-ice advantage.
That team looked nothing like the one that was embarrassed 5-1 in its own rink in front of the largest crowd of the Ramblers’ season in Game 4 to hand home ice back to the Bearcats, or the one that gave up three power-play goals that proved to be the difference in a 6-3 setback in Game 5 in Truro on Sunday.
Of the 11 goals the Ramblers have surrendered in the last two games, five have been while at least a man down.
“On Saturday, after it got to be 5-0, we tried to send a message,” Turner said.
“But down there (in Game 5), there were no excuses. I thought we played well enough to win that game, but penalties were the difference, and that’s all it was.
"We still have faith and we’re still confident. If we can cut it down to four or five penalties, we should be all right. Five-on-five, I think we’re just as strong if not better than they are.”
Matthew Squires, the leading pointgetter in franchise history, is another of the 20-year-olds facing the possibility of playing their last game in a Ramblers uniform tonight. Kelan Herr, Andrew Flemming, Adam Verrette, Andrew Shears and Paul Roebothan are the others.
“We don’t want the season to end, and we certainly don’t want it to end for our 20-year-olds,” Ramblers head coach Corey Crocker said.
“We have to stick to our game plan, which is a plan that’s worked against that team in this series. But we have to be better in terms of our discipline.
“As a coach, sometimes you wish you could just press a magic button and pull your team back a bit when things get heated, but guys have to learn for themselves what it takes. We just have to suck it up and get the job done.”

jjewers@amherstdaily.com