SUMMERSIDE, Prince Edward Island – In their first-ever appearance at Canada’s National Junior A Championship, the Niverville Nighthawks captured the 2026 Centennial Cup, presented by Tim Hortons, with a 4-1 win over the host Summerside Western Capitals on Sunday night.
It was a historic run for the Nighthawks, who joined the Manitoba Junior Hockey League (MJHL) as an expansion franchise in 2022. Niverville went unbeaten in six games in Summerside and lost only one game from Feb. 16 onwards, finishing with 29 wins in its last 30 games. Including regular season and playoffs, the Nighthawks finished with a 69-6-1 record (W-L-OTL).
“I came to his team first as one of the owners, then as stepping in as coach 18 months into the program,” said Dwight Hirst. “Having my hand as ownership, coach and now with a national championship, words cannot describe the feeling of how proud I am of these young men.”
The teams traded goals two minutes apart in the first period. The Nighthawks opened the scoring at 8:07 when Hayden Wheddon (Stonewall, MB) finished off a pretty passing play to beat Summerside goaltender Kolton Bourret (Thunder Bay, ON) for a 1-0 lead. Summerside sent the sold-out crowd into a frenzy when Jordan Shaw (Coleman, PE) jumped on a misplayed puck to even the score shorthanded.
Wheddon scored what would stand as the game-winning goal—his sixth of the tournament—at 11:12 of the second period and Marlen Edwards (Winnipeg, MB) added insurance with 5:26 left in the third before Tyler Bernier (Winnipeg, MB) scored into an empty net.
“We had a motto and that was just to break the game out into four- or five-minute segments. Let’s get it to 15, then 10, five and then zero. It was just about breaking it down and not worrying about the end game. We just wanted to go through the process, keeping Summerside on their heels instead of us being on ours,” added Hirst.
Goaltending was the story for the Nighthawks as Austin Dubinsky (Ardrossan, MB) was terrific in a 34-save performance as the Western Capitals outshot Niverville 35-20.
“I just finally got in a rhythm,” said Dubinsky. “It was at the end of our [semifinal] I started feeling myself and guys started making it easy on me, seeing everything from the outside, no traffic, so kudos to the group, it was awesome. From the start of the year our group had a goal and that was to play the last game of the year. We did that, we got our opportunity and made the most of it tonight.”
“Obviously he wants that one back on the dump-in and the little glove giveaway, but as soon as that happened I looked at our coaches and our players we all knew there wasn’t another one going by him tonight,” said Hirst. “He played unreal, save after save after save in key moments and just killing their momentum.”
Full game stats and game summary are available HERE.
Game highlights can be downloaded HERE.
Niverville was undefeated through the preliminary round to win Group A with a 3-1-0-0 record (W-OTW-OTL-L). The Nighthawks posted wins over Summerside (5-4 in OT), the Thunder Bay North Stars (7-2), Canmore Eagles (6-4) and Rockland Nationals 7-6 before a 4-3 semifinal win over the Toronto Patriots.
Prior to the game, the tournament award winners were announced:
For more information on Hockey Canada and the 2026 Centennial Cup, presented by Tim Hortons, please visit HockeyCanada.ca, or follow along through social media on Facebook, X, Instagram and TikTok.