President's Update - December 12th, 2016

Bulldogs, Monarchs and Maroons win weekend games...A very cold weekend saw six games played in the HHL and Bethune, Lumsden and Strasbourg solidified their hold on first, second and third place with victories. The third place Strasbourg Maroons played the Arrows in Avonlea on Friday evening and after giving up a 5-2 lead in the third period and forced into overtime; the Maroons got a goal from their leading scorer, Greg Ferguson, 57 seconds into the extra frame and pulled out a 6-5 victory. Ferguson scored three times, Sean Delwo scored twice and Tyson Orban scored for the Maroons. Jessie Hall provided a natural hat trick for the Arrows which included a shorthanded tally. Kyle Oleniuk and Wil Putland also scored for the Arrows. Tyler Kifferling picked up the win in net for Strasbourg and Dean Brothen was in net for the Arrows. The Arrows had four minor penalties and the Marrons had three. On Saturday evening in Strasbourg the Maroons did things in reverse of the Friday game against the Raymore Rockets. Down 3-1 after the first period, the Maroons scored three times in the second period and again in the third and held on for a 5-4 victory. Garret Lockeridge scored twice for the Maroons. Sean Delwo, Dylan Marcott and Mark Cross with the winning goal also scored for the Maroons. Bradyn Melrose, Josh Jordan, Michael Jordan and Brett Mohr scored for the Rockets. Jeremy Ellis stopped 26 of 30 shots sent his way and picked up the victory in net for the Maroons. David Perkin stopped 18 in the Rocket’s net. The Rockets had six minor penalties and misconduct. The Maroons had four minor penalties, a major and a game misconduct. The second place Lumsden Monarchs had two home games on the weekend. They defeated the Wynyard Monarchs 8-2 on Friday evening and the Cupar Canucks 11-1 on Saturday evening. On Friday evening Andrew Perrault and Mason Haus each had two goals for the Monarchs. These were the first two goals that Haus has scored in the HHL with the second one coming on the power play. Robert Hillier had four assists in this game. Brady Aulie, Liam Brennan, Torey Lindsey and Kyle Johnson also scored for Lumsden. Drew Litwin on the power play and Kyle Kinequon scored for Wynyard. Will Hood was in the Lumsden net stopping 26 shots. Adam Jordan stopped 52 of 60 shots fired his way in the Wynyard net. Lumsden had one minor penalty and Wynyard had four. On Saturday evening the Monarchs Kyle Johnson led the way with four goals and two assists for the Monarchs. Liam Brennan, Dale Spelchen, Andrew Perrault with two goals, Brady Aulie with a goal and four assists, Torrey Lindsey and Ryan Herman also scored for the Monarchs. Travis Orr scored on the power play for the Canucks. Will Hood stopped 27 shots in the Lumsden net and Will Kehler stopped 42 shots in the Cupar net. Cupar had six minor penalties and Lumsden had four minor penalties and two misconducts.

The first place Bethune Bulldogs defeated the Wynyard Monarchs 13-2 on Saturday evening for their ninth win of the season. 2016 All Star Center Kyle Ross led the way with three goals and two assists. Jacob Ulmer had three goals and an assist. Paul Albers and Drew George each scored twice. Joel Kot had a shorthanded goal and three assists and Russ Nielson and Mitch Boucher also scored. Mike Reich had four assists for the Bulldogs. Eric Popadynec and Nowell Greasley each scored on the power play for Wynyard. Ryan Seibel was in net for the Bulldogs and stopped 15 shots. Mason Brewster was in net for the Monarchs and stopped 37 shots. Wynyard had six minor penalties and Bethune had three. The other game on the weekend saw the Raymore Rockets defeat the Cupar Canucks 10-3 at home on Friday evening. Tyrell Shulko had two goals and an assist, Cole Melrose had two goals and Michael Jordan had a shorthanded goal and five assists to lead the Rockets. Bradyn Melrose, Braden Bentz, Bryan McNabb, Josh Belair and Nelson Davis scored for the Rockets. Travis Orr, Matthew Boha and Ethan Hart scored for the Canucks. Riley Focht-Gabriel was in net for the Rockets and Colby Miller for two periods and Tanner Kehler for one period were in the Canucks net.

Kyle Ross from Bethune leads all scorers in both goals and assists. Ross has 14 goals and 18 assists for 32 points to lead all scorers. Teammates Jacob Ulmer and drew George are tied for second with 28 points. Michael Jordan from Raymore is fourth with 23 points and Greg Ferguson from Strasbourg and Mike Reich from Bethune round out the top five scorers with 21 points each. Dale Spelchen leads all scorers with four game winning goals. Drew George from Bethune leads all scorers with four power play goals. Sean Delwo from Strasbourg and Michael Jordan from Raymore lead all scorers with two shorthanded goals each. Liam Brennan has scored first goal of the game three times for the Lumsden Monarchs. Lumsden now leads the team goaltending with a 3.00 GAA. Bethune is second with a 3.22 GAA. Will Hood leads all goalies with a 2.00 GAA. Ryan Holfeld from Bethune is next with a 3.07 GAA and leads all goalies with 6 wins. Adam Jordan from Wynyard leads all goalies with 400 minutes played. In team statistics….Power plays continue to be strong…the Wynyard Monarchs lead all teams with a 39.3% success rate on the power play. The Bethune Bulldogs are second at 37% and the Cupar Canucks are next at 30.4%. The Raymore Rockets are last at 22.2% which is still good. On the penalty killing side well it’s only natural if we are seeing lots of power play goals that this statistics aren’t as good as they might be on this side. The best penalty kill unit in the league belongs to Lumsden who successfully kill 78.1% of power play plays against them. Strasbourg is next at 77.5% and Raymore is third at 76.7%. The Avonlea Arrows are last at 56.5%.

After Lumsden plays in Avonlea on Tuesday night, we have six games in the next week before Christmas. The League will begin again on January 6th. On Friday evening the Bethune Bulldogs (9-0-0) are in Strasbourg to play the Maroons (5-4-1) and the Raymore Rockets (3-4-0) are in Wynyard to play the Monarchs (2-6-0) at 8:30 p.m. On Saturday evening Wynyard is in Cupar to play the Canucks (1-8-0) and the Rockets are in Avonlea to play the Arrows (2-4-1). On Tuesday, December 20th the Lumsden Monarchs (7-1-0) host the Raymore Rockets and Avonlea is at Cupar. Please note that the Lumsden at Bethune game scheduled for Saturday, December 17th has been moved to Sunday, January 8th at 5 p.m.

You can 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/GerladT Thank you for supporting the Highway Hockey League and please get out to a game near you.

Gerry