President's Update - January 9th, 2017

Provincial Draws are up....

Cupar Canucks pick up two wins on weekend….Bethune Bulldogs take care of Raymore and Lumsden…it was Mark Cross night in Wynyard…Kyle Ross continues to lead the scoring race…

The Cupar Canucks defeated the Avonlea Arrows 4-3 in Avonlea on Friday evening and then disposed of the Strasbourg Maroons 5-1 at home Saturday evening for their fourth straight victory. In Avonlea the Canucks got goals from Brayden Frank, Tyler Wilyman and a power play goal from Cody Hall and led the Arrows 3-1 after one period. In the second period Frank would score the winner on the power play midway through the period. The Arrows got a goal in each period with Brett Kealey scoring the first, Jessie Hall scoring in the second and Austin Lightfoot scoring in the third. Colby Miller picked up the win in net for the Canucks and Dean Brothen was in net for the Arrows. The Arrows had nine minor penalties, misconduct, a fighting major and a game misconduct. The Canucks had five minor penalties, a fighting major and a game misconduct. Tyler Wilyman from the Canucks and Stuart Holland from the Arrows both received one game suspension for game misconducts in the last 10 minutes of the game. On Saturday evening against the Maroons, the Canucks scored three times in the first period with Travis Orr, Elliott Hubick and Dallas Michlik coring. Brayden Frank scored in the second period and Michlik got his second of the evening in the third. Greg Ferguson scored late in the game to foil the shut out bud by Colby Miller. A skirmish in the second period sent everyone on the ice to the box. There were only six minor penalties in the game but the Canucks and Maroons would each end up with a major, a game misconduct and four misconducts from the second period encounter. Miller picks up the win in net and Jeremy Ellis was in net for the Maroons.

Bethune Bulldogs take care of both of their closest pursuers…The Bethune Bulldogs defeated the Raymore Rockets 10-1 on Friday evening at home and then defeated the Lumsden Monarchs 7-3 on Sunday to go to twelve straight wins this season. On Saturday evening the Bulldogs scored four times in the first period and three times in the second and third frames. Mike Reich scored twice; Matt Delahey scored twice including a power play marker; Mitch Boucher had a power play goal and Justin Schulhauser had a shorthanded goal. Kyle Ross, Jacob Ulmer, Drew George and Russ Nielson also scored. Mason Nedjelski scored late for the Rockets to take away the shutout from Ryan Holfeld who stopped 27 shots for the Bulldogs. David Perkin stopped 37 shots in the Rocket’s net. Each team had eight minor penalties and two misconducts. On Sunday the Bulldogs fired 36 shots in the first period at Matt Weninger in the Monarch’s net. There was a power play goal from Kyle Ross and even strength goals from Matt Delahey and Carson Sinclair to give the Bulldogs a 3-0 lead after one period. In the second period there were six goals in the first eight minutes. Denby Haysom, Tyler Penny and Kyle Johnson on the power play scored for the Monarchs. Joel Kot, Drew George and Jacob Ulmer scored for the Bulldogs. Ulmer would get his second goal of the game late to make the final 7-3. The Monarchs had five minor penalties and the Bulldogs had seven and a misconduct. Weninger stopped 52 shots in the Monarch’s net and Ryan Holfeld picked up the win for the Bulldogs stopping 23 shots.

There were two more games on Friday evening with Raymore defeating the Lumsden Monarchs 4-2 in Raymore and Strasbourg defeating the Wynyard Monarchs 7-5 in Wynyard. In Raymore, The Monarchs got first period power play goals from Andrew Perrault and Tyler Penny and Michael Jordan would score for the Rockets and it was 2-1 for the Monarchs going into the second period. Michael Jordan and Josh Jordan would score in the second period to give the Rockets a 3-2 lead going into the third period. Michael Jordan would complete the hat trick in the third period to make the final 4-2 and give the Rockets a 2-1 record for the season series against the Monarchs. Riley Focht-Gabriel picked up his second win in net against the Monarchs and Will Hood was in net for the Monarchs. Raymore had six minor penalties and Lumsden had two. Also on Friday evening in Wynyard it was the Mark Cross show as he scored the natural hat trick, in fact the last four goals of the game (I'm told this is called a "haul" in soccer) as the Maroons won 7-5. Cross scored once on the power play, once shorthanded and twice even strength including the game winner. With two assists added he had a six point night. Tyson Orban, Greg Ferguson and Dylan Marcott scored the other three goals for the Maroons. Wynyard got scoring from Nowell Greasley, Kyle Kinequon, Carter Buffalo, Jordan Karakochuk and Regan Morris. Tyler Kifferling picked up the win in net for the Maroons and Adam Jordan was in net for the Monarchs. Wynyard had three minor penalties and Strasbourg had two. All of the penalties came in the second period. The Monarchs came back on Saturday evening at home and defeated the Avonlea Arrows 3-2 in overtime. Avonlea started the scoring just 18 seconds into the game as Brett Kealey scored. Jordan Karakochuk would even the game up late in the period for the Monarchs. In the second period Justin Nychuk would give the Arrows a 2-1 lead going into the third period. Carter Buffalo would score in the third period to tie the game 2-2 and send game to overtime. Just 19 seconds into overtime Eric Popadynec would score to give the Monarchs a 3-2 victory and their first win since November 26th when they defeated these same Arrows 5-2.

Ross leads scoring race…Kyle Ross of the Bulldogs continues to lead the scoring race with 18 goals and 23 assists for 41 points in 11 games played. He leads the league in goals and assists. Drew George from the Bulldogs is next with 34 points. Michael Jordan from the Rockets has 33 points. Jacob Ulmer from the Bulldogs is next with 32 points and Mike Reich from the Bulldogs is fifth with 28 points. Brayden Frank from the Cupar Canucks leads all scorers with five power play goals and Drew George from the Bulldogs is next with four. Dale Spelchen leads all scorers with four game winning goals for the Lumsden Monarchs and Eric Popadynec from the Wynyard Monarchs is next with three. Will Hood from Lumsden leads all goalies with a 2.33 GAA followed by Ryan Holfeld of the Bulldogs who is at 2.79. Holfeld leads the league with 9 wins and Adam Jordan leads all goalies with 640.3 minutes played. Ryan Seibel and Ryan Holfeld lead the Team Goaltending category with a 2.98 GAA. Will Hood and Matt Weninger from Lumsden are next with a 3.25 GAA. The least penalized teams in the league are the Lumsden Monarchs at 12.5 minutes per game and the Avonlea Arrows at 12.6 minutes. The most penalized team in the league are the Strasbourg Maroons at 20.6 minutes per game and the Bethune Bulldogs at 20 minutes per game. The Bethune Bulldogs lead the league on the power play at 35.6%. The surging Cupar Canucks are next at 31.6% and the Wynyard Monarchs are third at 26.7%. The top penalty killing unit belongs to the Lumsden Monarchs at 81.6%. They are followed by Raymore at 80% and Strasbourg at 78.7%. The Bethune Bulldogs lead the league with seven shorthanded goals and the Raymore Rockets have five. The Lumsden Monarchs and Wynyard Monarchs have each given up four shorthanded goals. The Bethune Bulldogs have scored first in 11 of their 12 games and have won them all. The Strasbourg Maroons have only scored first in one of their 13 games they have played this year and did not win that game, however, the Maroons have a 6-4-2 record when they don’t score first. Avonlea Arrows are the only team that has not won when they do not score first.

On Friday evening the second place Lumsden Monarchs (8-4-0) are in Wynyard to meet the northern Monarchs (3-9-0) at 8:30 p.m. and the Avonlea Arrows (2-8-2) are in Raymore to play the third place Rockets (7-5-0). On Saturday evening the Wynyard Monarchs are in Avonlea, the Bethune Bulldogs (12-0-0) are in Cupar to play the fifth place Canucks (5-8-0) and the Raymore Rockets are in Strasbourg to play the fourth place Maroons (6-5-2).

Provincial Schedules will be up in the next week and we will have those games for you in next week’s column and will get them on our website and we will also report on Twitter. 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…Provincials are coming and so are playoffs!

Gerry