The Kelowna Raiders jumped out to 7-1 first-period lead and cruised to a 15-8 victory over the visiting Kamloops Rattlers to clinch their Thompson Okanagan Senior Lacrosse League semifinal series on Thursday.
The win earned the Raiders a berth in the TOSLL best-of-three Rowcliffe Cup championship series with the first-place Armstrong Shamrocks beginning on Wednesday in Armstrong.
Jared MacLennan scored four times to lead the Raiders who displayed outstanding ball control throughout Thursday’s game in front of a hometown crowd at Kelowna Memorial. Pho Heng completed a hat trick for the winners while Matt Gorges and Ryan Lindstrom contributed a pair of goals each. Singles came from Vic Wiens, Joe Brown, Nick Evans and captain Jacob Illichmann, who also helped set up six of the Kelowna goals.
The Raiders held the Rattlers’ top scorer, AJ Lockwood, to just two goals while Russ McIntosh added a pair of markers for Kamloops to go along with a goal apiece from Mark Jurista, Chris Kerrsens, Liam Hagerty and Ryan Oliverius.
Kelowna opened the best-of-three semifinal series with a 12-5 victory in Kelowna while the Rattlers won the second game 15-13 in Kamloops to force the third game.
Wednesday’s opening game of the final series begins at 7:30 p.m. at the NorVal Arena in Armstrong. The second game is set for Aug. 5 at Kelowna Memorial arena beginning at 7:30 p.m.
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