The Canada Winter Games girls' hockey team – a.k.a. the Northern Avalanche Hockey Club at Outside tournaments – are right where they should be, according to head coach Louis Bouchard.

The team won gold in the midget tier 3 division of the inaugural Wickenheiser International Women's Hockey Festival in Burnaby, B.C., from Nov. 18-21.

More than 900 young women from across North America and the Czech Republic – 54 total teams across 10 divisions – competed in the tournament and attended off-ice clinics and presentations from Olympic gold medal winners Hayley Wickenheiser and teammates Carla MacLeod and Gina Kingsbury, among many others.

The Northern Avalanche beat out Comox Valley, B.C., 4-0 in the final to take gold.

"We're exactly where I thought we'd be,” Bouchard said. "I'm surprised, actually.

The girls surprised me this weekend, and it was a good surprise.”

The biggest surprise was likely the Yukoners stingy goals against record: one goal in five games.

Goaltender Jocelyn Wynnyk played 14 periods without allowing a goal.

The Avalanche opened the tournament with a 2-0 win over the Washington Wild, and followed up that performance with a 7-0 victory against the North Shore Avalanche and a 4-0 win over the South Delta Storm on the second day of competition.

The club started the final day of the tournament with a 6-1 win over the Tri Cities Predators and the shutout final to clinch the gold medal.

"They were still excited, even though we dominated,” Bouchard said. "There's always that possibility that we could run out of steam. A 4-0 game, we may have spent most of our time in their zone, but it's still just a 4-0 game; it's not like we beat that team in the final by a 10-point spread.”

Tamara Greek scored six goals and three assists, Linsey Eby notched five goals one assist, while Dana van Vliet of Haines Junction and Adrianne Dewhurst of Teslin each earned four points in five games.

"I'm really proud of the team,” Bouchard said. "They worked hard; they deserved first place.”

Captain Savannah van Vliet said the tournament – and the result – came at the right time for her club.

"It felt pretty good,” the 17-year-old laughed. "It was a big confidence booster for our team.”

With ages ranging from 12-17-years-old, the Northern Avalanche are automatically slotted in tier 3 midget, due to demographics, Bouchard explained, adding that he hopes to register for tier 2 in the future to attract better competition.

"Some of these girls have never been to a tournament,” he said. "This was a big tournament with over 50 teams, players at every level, coming from as far away as the Czech Republic. Lots of distraction. We went there to give them that experience. Our main goal was to see if our players were in good enough shape to keep the tempo up for the whole weekend. And they did.

"Everybody brought up their level of play. We went to bantam AAA provincials a couple years ago with some of these girls and we were losing 20-0. The new players, we didn't know how they would react (last weekend), and they just put their game faces on and did what was needed.”

His captain agreed.

"I think we were all kind of nervous, if we got ahead, if we were going to be able to keep the momentum up; but, focusing on that, we were able to keep pushing,” van Vliet said, adding of the young players: "They did great. We have a couple of smaller girls on our team and they played really well.”

Another goal, Bouchard added, was to play disciplined hockey.

On that front, the team succeeded: nine penalties in five games, allowing zero goals against and scoring a short-handed goal.

"Some of the other teams were getting frustrated with the fact that not only were we winning but we were winning by shutouts,” Bouchard said.

"Our fore-check and the girls' skating was just so much better than everybody else.

The other thing is, after a tournament like this – we played five games in three days – most other teams were running out of steam, and our athletes have been getting ready for this for eight months.”

The club, which has a 5-6-1 record in the bantam division of the Whitehorse Minor Hockey League, clocks four on-ice sessions each week, between games and practices, and a dry-land session in preparation for the 2011 Canada Winter Games in Halifax, N.S., in February.

van Vliet said the work the coaches have been putting the team through paid off over the weekend.

"We've been practising a lot of defensive positioning, and I think that helped our team a lot. As well, we've been working on our breakouts, and they were running

really smoothly,” van Vliet said.

"We've worked hard and it's good to come out with that win.”

Her and her teammates attended the presentation by MacLeod on Friday, which she said was an inspiring way to kick-off the tourney.

"I thought it was incredible, how much she pushed to get there,” van Vliet said. "I think having that talk at the beginning helped drive us forward.”

MacLeod explained her journey, from going to the 1995 and 1999 Canada Winter Games (her first when she was 12-years-old), to making the Canadian National Women's Team after a number of tryouts.

"It doesn't come easy, if you're going to be skating at that level,” Bouchard said.

"We can tell the girls all of that until we're blue in the face, but when it comes from people that have been there, it's got a bit more weight.”

Despite the weekend's result, however, Bouchard said there is still plenty of work to be done to bring the team up to the level they'll face in Halifax.

"We play at a midget level with peewee and bantam girls. Half our girls are first-year midgets, so we're at a disadvantage compared to the other provinces. So now

it's about working on bringing our game up, pushing the girls a little further. I think they've gained some assurance this week, but they still need bring it up.”

He added: "It's less than three months to Canada Games, and the teams we're going to play are 1,000 times better than what we played this weekend.”

The tournament raised money for Kidsport BC and Right to Play, raising awareness about women's hockey and creating lasting bonds between the players across all teams from all walks of life.

Fresh off the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics, WickFest offered young women a chance to engage in world-class competition, make friends from around the world, improve their hockey skills and learn from one of the world's best – Wickenheiser – who was involved in all aspects of the on-and-off ice event.

Other special guests at the festival included former NHLers Trevor Linden and Ryan Walter, young Vancouver Canucks superstar Mason Raymond and Olympic gold medalist and rower Ben Rutledge and Olympic swimmer Scott Dickens.

"The festival was everything I wanted it to be and more thanks to our sponsors who saw the value of investing in the empowerment of these young women both on and off the ice,” Wickenheiser said in a release.

"My hope is that they have all left here with a sense of, ‘Why not me?' And that they can do anything they set their minds to.”