By CLAUDE SCILLEY

It has variously been seen as both a curse and a blessing.

Having the single most important game of the entire season be, essentially, an exhibition game has been the bane of Royal Military College hockey coaches, especially those whose conference season still has meaning. Travelling to West Point, N.Y., near the end of a season when a playoff berth may still hang in the balance can be a nuisance; a distraction and one more road trip a team with higher aspirations doesn’t need.

Then there are years where the regular campaign has long ago gone south, and the annual match with the U.S. Military Academy is a darn useful fixture to have on the schedule of a team that may otherwise have lost interest.

Count this year’s group of Paladins among the latter.

“As much as this year has been a real downer, a good result at West Point, followed by a good result in Carr-Harris (the annual trophy match with Queen’s), can put a nice Band-aid on an (unfortunate) season,” RMC coach Adam Shell said the other night.

Don’t rule out that even a winless team such as this year’s RMC varsity, 0-18-3 in Ontario University Athletics play, won’t be able to gather the wherewithal to win this game.

For one thing, Army hasn’t exactly been tearing up the NCAA this year, with an overall record of 5-16-2, and just three victories in 13 home games.

The Black Knights have lost their last two games, last weekend at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado, and they’ve won just once in eight games since Nov. 29.

RMC, meanwhile, has played the best hockey of a dreadful season in the past two weeks, with an overtime loss at Laurentian and a one-goal defeat at the hands of No. 9-ranked McGill, in a game where the Paladins overcame a three-goal deficit only to succumb to a third-period score.

Never underestimate the resolve that a group of athletes frustrated by a season of disappointment can muster when a one-shot opportunity at some redemption presents itself.

“We’re excited,” Shell said. “The guys are always excited; it’s a big moment to go there.”

Dating to 1923, the RMC-West Point exchange was the oldest international hockey rivalry in the world until it was interrupted for four years in 2007. As the one thing that regularly binds two tradition-rich military academies, it is the single event on the RMC athletic calendar that captures the collective fancy of cadets, faculty and brass alike.

In good seasons and bad, both teams play with a level of vigor they seldom replicate.

“It’s a big moment to go there,” Shell said. “The meaning of the game goes without saying; it’s been explained a thousand times.”

Since its reinstatement on a trial basis in 2011, when Army won 9-1, there have been two games, both won by the Knights, 4-1 at West Point in 2013 and 5-2 last year in Kingston.

Since RMC’s last hurrah—four wins in six years, from 1982-87—the Paladins have won just twice, in 2000 (3-0) and 2002 (3-2 in overtime). Since them, Army is 17-2-3 and the Knights lead the all-time series 41-29-7.

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The marquee event on the local intercollegiate calendar this weekend is the Queen’s women’s hockey game Friday night, when the Gaels will face the Guelph Gryphons at the Memorial Centre at 7:30.

Queen’s, 12-2-3 and the No. 4-ranked team in Canada, stands second in the OUA, three points behind league-leading Western. In a conference where the second- through sixth-place teams are separated by just four points, Guelph, 11-2-3 and the seventh-ranked team in the land, stands tied for fourth place with Toronto.

In their previous meeting, the Gryphons posted a 1-0 home-ice win on Nov. 8. Guelph goaltender Stephanie Nehring made 16 saves in that game for the first of her three shutouts this season.

Nehring leads the league in both goals-against average (1.25) and save percentage (.943) for a Guelph team that has allowed the second-fewest goals of any team (1.50 per game) in Canada.

Queen’s, meanwhile, is second only to Guelph in Ontario, having allowed 1.53 goals per game, and with 54 goals in 17 games, the Gaels are tied with Laurier for having the most prolific offence in the OUA.

Leading that attack are Shawna Griffin and Taryn Pilon, each with eight goals and 11 assists. Griffin has five of her team’s 10 goals in the last four games.

The Gaels will also host Brock this weekend. Queen’s, undefeated (8-0) at home this year, won its game in St. Catharines Nov. 9, 4-3.

The Badgers come to town with three familiar faces in the lineup, second-year defender Bronwyn O’Neill of Erinsville (no points in 14 games), and rookies Brenna Murphy of Odessa (no points in 14 games) and Kailey Peirson of Kingston (one goal, two assists in 10 games).

The Queen’s men, 9-11-1, having broken their six-game losing streak with a 3-2 overtime win over Waterloo last Saturday, have one game this weekend, Friday night at No. 8 McGill. The Redmen, 16-5 and tied for second in the East division, have won three in a row, after dropping their first two after the Christmas break.

The teams met to open the regular season in Kingston on Oct. 10, when the Gaels overcame deficits of 1-0 and 3-1 only to surrender a power-play goal by Samuel Labrecque with 14 seconds left in the third period that gave the Redmen a 4-3 win.

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St. Lawrence Vikings will put their six-game Ontario Colleges Athletic Association men’s basketball winning streak on the line Friday night at Seneca. The Vikings, 8-5, lost 81-73 to the Sting at home in early November, the third game of what would be a four-game losing streak.

Seneca, 7-5, will pose a formidable challenge for the Vikings, who have just eight players at their disposal. Though the Sting has lost two of its last three games, it has scored less than 80 points just once in its last six outings.

Saturday afternoon, St. Lawrence will play George Brown, which enters the weekend 7-7, the seventh-place team in a division where four teams still have a shot at first place and just six points separate the third- through eighth-place teams. Only six teams will qualify for the playoffs.

The St. Lawrence women, 9-1 and the first-place team in the East division, also play at Seneca, 4-6, and George Brown, 1-10. Their 77-52 win over Algonquin last Saturday—Algonquin’s first loss in 68 games over the last four years—vaulted the Vikings from 13th to eighth in the national ranking.

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At the Queen’s Athletics and Recreation Centre, the women’s basketball team, 7-3 and winner of five in a row, will try to put some distance between itself and the Toronto Blues, 6-4 but winners of their only two conference games since Christmas. Game time is 6 p.m.

Saturday night, the Gaels will host the East division-leading Ryerson Rams, 9-3 and the eighth-ranked team in Canada. The Rams have won their last three games, after losing to Toronto to start the second half of the season.

The Queen’s men, 3-7, will also play Toronto and Ryerson at home this weekend, in games starting at 8 o’clock. Toronto, also 3-7, snapped a four-game losing streak with a 20-point victory over Algoma in its last game; Ryerson, 10-2, leads the East division and is the No. 3-ranked team in Canada.