President's Update - December 10th, 2017

Rockets roll at home...The Raymore Rockets went 3 for 3 on the power play in the first period and went on to beat the Strasbourg Maroons 8-1 on Friday evening in Raymore. Tyrell Shulko scored two of the power play goals and Josh Jordan scored the other as the Rockets built a 4-0 lead in the first period. Tyler Bell, Michael Jordan with two goals, Catlin Sich and Tristan Third also scored for the Rockets. Garret Lockeridge scored for the Maroons. Dean Brothen picked up the win in net for the Rockets and Dallin Sorensen and Tyler Kifferling both had time in the Maroon's net. Each team had three minor penalties. Bulldogs win fifth in a row...The Maroons were coming off a 6-4 loss Wednesday evening against the Bethune Bulldogs. Chris Merkel and Carter Smith scored to give the Bulldogs a 2-0 lead after one period. Brett Kealy would score on the power play for the Maroons in the second period and it was 2-1 for the Bulldogs going into the third period. Tanner Exner would score a power play goal to tie the game 2-2 and then Coltyn Sanderson with a power play goal and Mark Lustig would score quick goals to put the Bulldogs back up by a goal. Tyson Orban would then score for the Maroons and that was followed by a goal from Eric Schultz and the game was tied 4-4. With two minutes left in the game Carter Smith would score a shorthanded goal to give the lead back to the Bulldogs. Coltyn Sanderson would get a late goal to make the final 6-4. Ryan Holfeld made 25 stops in the Bethune net for the victory. Rhett Freistadt made 45 stops in the Strasbourg net. Bethune had nine minor penalties and Strasbourg had five minor penalties, one major and a game misconduct.

Monarchs stay on top...The Lumsden Monarchs defeated the Southey Marlins 5-2 on Friday evening to move to 6-1-0. League leading scorer Kyle Johnson led the way with a hat trick including two power play goals. Justin Nychuk had two goals for the Monarchs. Drew Wilde and Landon Melkie scored for Southey. The Monarchs had a 5-1 lead going into the second period. They also led in the shot clock 25 -12. In the third period the Marlins outshot the Monarchs 19-6 but could only get one shot past goalie Will Hood. Hood stopped 31 shots for the victory in the Monarchs net. Landin Moldenhauer stopped 26 shots in the Southey net. Lumsden had six minor penalties, two major penalties and two game misconducts. Southey had six minor penalties, one major penalty and a game misconduct. Brett Mohr received a one game suspension for an instigator penalty. Canucks come back again...Southey was coming off a tough 4-3 loss to the Cupar Canucks on the previous Tuesday evening. The Canucks, for the second game in a row, came back in the third period with two unanswered goals to win the game in Southey. Dylan Mohr and Evan Mohr scored first period goals for the Marlins and Kyle Hall scored for the Canucks and it was 2-1 going into the second period. Hall would score on the power play in the second period and the game was tied 2-2 going into the third period. Eight minutes into the third period Cody Straker would score on the power play and the Marlins were back up 3-2. With less than seven minutes left in the game Cody Hall would score for the Canucks and then just over a minute later Brayden Frank would pot the winner for the Canucks. Tanner Kehler picked up the win in net for the Canucks and Landin Moldenhauer was in net for the Marlins. The Canucks had five minor penalties and the Marlins had ten minor penalties, three misconducts and one game misconduct. Derek Halldorson was suspended one game for taking two misconducts and a game misconduct as per SHA rule 9.2b.

Marlins defeat Rockets at home...The Southey Marlins bounced back from their loss to the Monarchs with a 5-4 victory over the Raymore Rockets on Saturday evening. Two goals from Travis Mohr and a goal from Evan Mohr gave the Marlins a 3-0 lead after one period. In the second period the Rockets would storm back with three goals coming from Tristan Third, Emery Anderson and Josh Jordan. In the third period Ryley Storzuk would score twice to put the Marlins back up 5-3. Michael Jordan would score on the power play for the Rockets but that is as close as they would get. Ryan Senft would pick up the win in the Marlins net and Riley Focht-Gabriel would play the first period in net for the Rockets and Dean Brothen would play the final two periods. The Rockets were assessed four minor penalties and a misconduct and the Marlins received five minor penalties and a misconduct. In Cupar on Saturday evening the Canucks had a 3-1 lead over the Lumsden Monarchs five minutes into the second period. The Monarchs would score four times in the remainder of the second period and had a 5-3 lead going into the third period. In the third period Cupar would score once and the Monarchs would hold on for the 5-4 victory. Josh Beaudry would lead the way for the Monarchs as he scored twice including a power play goal that would prove to be the winner for the Monarchs. James Beattie, Justin Nychuk and Aaron DeCorby also scored for Lumsden. Brayden Frank scored twice for the Canucks to stay within one point of Kyle Johnson in the League scoring race. Matthew Boha had a power play goal for the Canucks and Kyle Hall scored a shorthanded goal. Will Hood picked up the win in the Lumsden net and Colby Miller was in net for the Canucks. Lumsden had four minor penalties and Cupar had five.

The AAA Bethune Bulldogs played an exhibition game in Caronport on Friday evening and won 6-5.

Additions: Bethune Bulldogs add non-elites Chris Merkel and Logan Petlak. Raymore Rockets add locals Byron Horvath and Caitlin Sich.

Kyle Johnson from the Monarchs leads the scoring race with 18 points. Brayden Frank from Cupar is next with 17 points. Tyrell Shulko from Raymore and Torey Lindsey from Lumsden are tied for third with 16 points. Kyle Hall from Cupar and Carter Smith from Bethune are tied for fifth with 15 points. Brayden Frank leads all scorers with 10 goals. Kyle Johnson leads the league with 14 assists. Tyrell Shulko leads all scorers with 4 power play goals. Ryan Holfeld from Bethune leads all goalies with four wins and a 2.60 GAA. Kurtis Sollosy from Lumsden is next with a 3.33 GAA and Tanner Kehler from Cupar is next with a 3.92 GAA. In team goaltending, Bethune leads with a 2.83GAA followed by Lumsden at 3.88 GAA and Cupar with a 4.33 GAA.  The top power play in the league belongs to the Lumsden Monarchs who are clicking at a 31% success rate. Raymore Rockets are next at 29.6% and they are followed by Bethune at 27.3% The Monarchs also have the best penalty killing unit which is at 90.6%. They are followed by Raymore at 86.4% and Cupar at 80%. Home teams are 12-9-1 so far this year and away teams are 10-12-0. The Southey Marlins are the most penalized team in the league averaging 26 minutes a game. The least penalized team in the league are the Raymore Rockets averaging 9.25 minutes per game.

On Tuesday evening the first place Lumsden Monarchs (7-1-0) host the fourth place Raymore Rockets (3-5-0) at 8 p.m. On Friday evening the Monarchs host the second place Bethune Bulldogs (5-1-0) at 8 p.m. Also Friday evening the fifth place Southey Marlins (2-5-0) are in Raymore to play the Rockets at 8:00 p.m. On Saturday evening the Bulldogs will play the third place Canucks (4-3-1) in Cupar. Also on Saturday evening the Monarchs are in Raymore to play the Rockets. and Strasbourg (1-6-0) is in Southey to play the Marlins. All games start at 8:00 p.m. On Sunday the Cupar Canucks will be in Strasbourg to play the Maroons at 6:00 p.m.

As always, thank you for supporting senior hockey and thanks for coming out to our games, we appreciate it. To keep up to date please follow us on twitter http://twitter.com/HighwayHockey all of our tweets, which include updates from all games, appear on the front page just under the Upcoming Games column if you just want to follow us on the website during games. You can also follow my account the Pensky File http://twitter.com/GeraldT 

Thank you for supporting the Highway Hockey League and we hope you can get out to a game near you!

Gerry Tomkins - President HHL