Champs hand-picked for success

Members of Akwesasne’s minor professional hockey team can now officially be called champions.

The Akwesasne Warriors captured the inaugural Federal Hockey League (FHL) championship title on March 26 with a 5-2 victory against the visiting New York Aviators.
With that triumph, the Warriors, who play their home games on the Canadian side of the Ontario/New York border Mohawk community, defeated the Aviators 3-1 in their best-of-five championship series.

Akwesasne was the only Canadian squad in the six-team FHL this season. The league also featured four clubs from the state of New York and one from Connecticut.
Warriors’ president/general manager Basem Awwad was confident his club was capable of winning the FHL title.

“We pretty much had hand-picked previous champions,” he said. “We picked our team from guys that knew how to win.”