Sports Oakville Beaver By Herb Garbutt OAKVILLE BEAVER STAFF SPORTS EDITOR: JON KUIPERIJ Phone 905-845-3824 (ext. 255) Fax 905-337-5567 email sports@oakvillebeaver.com · SATURDAY, MARCH 10, 2007 23 OT swimmer sets OFSAA mark Ridge student claims pair of golds at provincial championships She didn't realize she had broken the OFSAA record until one of her coaches told her. Her reaction: "Wow. I didn't even look at the records," she said. Though she was starting to feel the effects of a long day -- both her individual events were on Wednesday -- Petford turned in another great time in the final, a 33.63 to easily win the gold. Earlier in the day, Petford won a silver in the 100m individual medley, turning in a time of 1:14.03 to finish second to Yueyi Zhang of Georges Vanier Secondary School. Petford's two medals accounted for half of Oakville Trafalgar's total medal count and helped the Red Devils finish fifth overall in a field of 184 teams. Bates defended her OFSAA title in the senior girls' 100-metre backstroke Wednesday, adding to the gold medal she won the previous day in the 50m freestyle. Bates took almost three seconds off last year's winning time in the backstroke, finishing in one minute, 11.48 seconds to beat York Secondary's Hannah Moore by more than a second. Bates narrowly missed the podium in the freestyle last year, finishing fourth. This year she posted the best time in preliminaries and then RECORDHOLDER: Oakville Trafalgar High School student Rachel Petford displays the gold and silver medals she won at the Ontario Federation of School Athletic Associations swimming championships, held this past week in Etobicoke. Petford set a new OFSAA record while winning the junior girls' 50m backstroke, reaching the wall in 33.23 seconds. Iroquois Ridge student Lizzy Bates added a pair of golds at the provincial meet. RIZIERO VERTOLLI / OAKVILLE BEAVER Oakville Trafalgar High School student Rachel Petford turned in a record-setting performance and Lizzy Bates of Iroquois Ridge won two gold medals at the Ontario Federation of School Athletic Associations swimming championships this past week in Etobicoke. Petford had her work cut out for her in the junior girls' 50-metre backstroke. She was up against the reigning champion and OFSAA record-holder, Cassie Harrigan of Essex District, a fact of which she was blissfully unaware. "I didn't know until my mom told me in the car after," said the Grade 9 student, who made a point of crediting coaches Rob Sargant and Kathy Stearns-Brown for their role in her success. "I'm glad I didn't know. I think that would have made me really nervous and I was already really nervous." Just hoping to make the final, Petford held nothing back in the preliminaries and blazed her way to an OFSAA record-time of 33.23 seconds, shattering the previous mark of 34.05. She was thrilled by the time, but only because it matched her personal best set more than a year ago when she was a member of the Oakville Aquatic Club. See Silver page 24 Galbraith leads Wings into West final By Jon Kuiperij BEAVER SPORTS EDITOR LIESA KORTMANN / OAKVILLE BEAVER RED HOT: Hamilton Red Wings' Mike Galbraith leads all scorers after two rounds of the Provincial Junior A Hockey League playoffs. Mike Galbraith's breakthrough season keeps getting better. The 20-year-old local native leads the Provincial Junior A Hockey League's playoff scoring race after the first two rounds, having racked up 10 goals and 11 assists in 10 postseason games to help the Hamilton Red Wings advance to the West Conference championship series for the second straight year. Galbraith, who averaged more than a point per game during regular-season play and donned Canadian colours in last November's World Junior A Challenge, attributes his recent success to the comfort level he has found in his second year with the Wings. "Last year I came in as a rookie but, at the end of the year, I led the team in goals," Galbraith said. "That helped my confidence a lot. This year, I knew what was expected of me and I had some chemistry with the guys. It just clicked for us this year." Playing in the World Junior A Challenge, a showcase tournament for tier 2 junior players, didn't hurt Galbraith's confidence either. His Canada East team earned silver at the competition in Saskatchewan, winning its first three games before falling to Canada West in the championship game, with Galbraith contributing a goal and an assist to the cause. "They said that they liked my goal-scoring but they also liked my versatile play," said Galbraith, who admitted to not even knowing about the tournament before he received an invite from Canada East assistant coach Marty Abrams. "It was such an honour to be selected -- it's always a dream to wear your country's jersey. I got a bit of power play time there but, more importantly, I was a penalty-killer for them. When you go play for Team Canada, it has nothing to do with yourself. It's for your country and your team." Impressed by the speed and the skill level of the international players, Galbraith said the Provincial Junior A Hockey League felt much slower upon his return. He tallied 13 points in his first eight games following the tournament, and was a one-man wrecking crew in Hamilton's first-round sweep of the Streetsville Derbys -- scoring six goals and adding six assists in the four games. The White Oaks grad, now a commerce student at McMaster University, followed that up with a nine-point output in Hamilton's six-game West semifinal win over the Oakville Blades. "I knew a couple (Blades players) out there. They try to get under your skin and it's a little harder, but you get excited," Galbraith said of playing against his hometown team. Galbraith and the Red Wings open up their West Conference championship series tonight at home against the Georgetown Raiders, a 7:30 p.m. start at Dave Andreychuk Mountain Arena.