President's Update - January 16th, 2017

Raymore Rockets pick up two wins on weekend….The Raymore Rockets defeated the Avonlea Arrows at home on Friday evening 4-2 and then defeated the Strasbourg Maroons 6-5 in a shootout on Saturday evening in Strasbourg to move to 9-5-0 and sole possession of third place one point behind the Lumsden Monarchs. On Friday evening the Rockets got two power play goals from Josh Belair and a goal from Tyrell Shulko to carry a 3-0 lead into the second period. Josh Jordan would score in the second period and Dryden Isley would score for the Arrows to make it 4-1 going to the third period. Kyle Oleniuk would get a power play goal for the Arrows and the final score was 4-2 for the Rockets. David Perkin picked up the win in net for the Rockets and Jesse Gooding was in net for the Arrows. The Rockets had seven minor penalties and the Arrows had four. Jeff Hubic from the Arrows and Cole Melrose from the Rockets were assessed fighting majors and game misconducts late in the game and were both given one game suspensions. On Saturday evening the Maroons scored first as Dylan Marcott scored the only goal of the first period. Bradyn Melrose would score on the power play in the second to tie the game for the Rockets. Mark Cross and Sean Delwo would then score for the Maroons and it was 3-1 for Strasbourg going into the third period. In the third, Tyrell Shulko and Jordan Reeve scored to tie game 3-3. Greg Ferguson would score twice to give the Maroons a 5-3 lead but Michael Jordan would score and then Josh Jordan would score with 23 seconds left in the game to send this game to overtime. Nothing was decided in overtime and in the shootout the Rockets outscored the Maroons 2-1 with Tyrell Shulko getting credit for the winner and the final was 6-5 for the Rockets. Strasbourg was assessed four minor penalties and the Raymore had four. Riley Focht-Gabriel stopped 19 shots in the Rockets net for the win and Jeremy Ellis stopped 27 in the Strasbourg net. There have been six overtime games this season and the Maroons have been in five of those games. They have won one and lost three in overtime and have lost one in a shootout.

The other game on Friday evening saw the Lumsden Monarchs defeat the Wynyard Monarchs 8-2 in Wynyard. With that win Lumsden moved to 9-4-1 and in second place a point ahead of Raymore. Kyle Johnson and Brady Aulie both scored twice for Lumsden with Johnson scoring on the power play in the second period. Denby Haysom, Austin Preete and Jared Adams also scored for Lumsden. Tyler Penny scored on the power play for Lumsden. Jordan Karakochuk and Kevin Pelletier scored for Wynyard. Matt Weninger picked up the win in net for Lumsden and Adam Jordan was in net for Wynyard. Each team had four minor penalties.

Bethune Bulldogs have big comeback to go to 13-0-0…. The Bethune Bulldogs scored four unanswered goals in the third period at a game in Cupar on Saturday evening and defeated the Cupar Canucks 6-4. The Canucks got a goal from Brett Boha in the first period and that was matched by Kyle Ross. In the second period Travis Orr would score and then late in the period Joel Kot would tie it up for Bethune. Cody Hall and Matthew Boha on the power play would score late in the second period and Cupar would have a 4-2 lead going into the third period. Early in the third period Lucas Ulmer and Mike Reich would score to tie the game and then with five minutes left in the third period Bethune would get two quick goals from Drew George and Kyle Ross to make the final 6-4 for the Bulldogs. Cupar had seven minor penalties and Bethune had five. Ryan Seibel picked up the win in net for the Bulldogs and Tanner Kehler was in net for the Canucks. Also on Saturday evening the Avonlea Arrows bounced back from their loss in Raymore to defeat the Wynyard Monarchs 4-2 in Avonlea. The Arrows held the lead throughout the game leading 2-0 after one period and leading 3-1 after two periods. Brett Kealey scored twice, including the game winner, and Justin Nychuk and Kristian Brook also scored. Eric Popadynec and James Holowaty with a shorthanded goal scored for Wynyard. Dean Brothen picked up the win in net for the Arrows and Adam Jordan was in net for the Monarchs. The Arrows had five minor penalties and the Monarchs had eight plus a misconduct. Justin Nychuk had a game misconduct in the last ten minutes of the game and received a one game suspension.

Ross leads scoring race….Kyle Ross continues to lead the scoring race with 20 goals and 26 assists for 46 points. 2015 League MVP, Michael Jordan, has moved into second place with 13 goals and 25 assists for 38 points. Drew George from Bethune is next with 35 points followed by Jacob Ulmer from the Bulldogs with 34 points and Greg Ferguson from Strasbourg is fifth with 32 points. Bethune and Lumsden goalies continue to lead the goalie stats with Ryan Holfeld from the Bulldogs with nine wins and a 2.79 GAA. Will Hood from Lumsden is next with a 2.85GAA and he is followed by Ryan Seibel from Bethune with a 3.58GAA. Matt Weninger from Lumsden is fourth with a 3.86 GAA. Adam Jordan from Wynyard leads all goalies with 760.3 minutes played. Bethune leads team goaltending with a 3.06 GAA followed by Lumsden with a 3.35 GAA. In other team statistics, the Bethune Bulldogs are the top power play team with a 32.8% success rate. They are followed by Cupar at 31.7% and Lumsden at 25%. The top penalty killing team would be the Lumsden Monarchs at 83% followed by Raymore at 81.5% and Strasbourg at 76.5%.

Provincials are about to start…The Provincial schedule is out. We tried to lessen the load on teams for the last two weeks of January as that is when Provincial ‘A’ normally starts but not this year. The only team we have starting in January are the Raymore Rockets. Their first round two game total point Provincial ‘C’ series begins Wednesday, January 25th in Raymore against the Central Butte Flyers of the SVHL. Game two of that series is on Sunday, January 29th in Central Butte at 3:00 p.m. In Provincial “A”, the Bethune Bulldogs will start defence of their title against the Davidson Cyclones of the LLHL. The Lumsden Monarchs play against the Leroy Braves of the LLHL and the Avonlea Arrows play the Balgonie Bisons of the QVHL. These three series must be done by February 13th. In Provincial “B” the Wynyard Monarchs have a bye into the second round and wait to see who wins between Watrous Winterhawks of the LLHL and the Biggar Nationals of the SWHL. They will begin second round play in the middle of February. In Provincial ‘D’ the Cupar Canucks face the Bredenbury Cougars from the Triangle Hockey League. This series must be done by February 13th. The Strasbourg Maroons are not entered in provincials although some of their players have been picked up for provincial teams.

This week we have the Avonlea Arrows in Bethune to play the Bulldogs at 8:15 on Wednesday. On Friday, Cupar is in Raymore to play the Rockets and the Bethune is in Wynyard to play the Monarchs at 8:30 p.m. On Saturday Lumsden is in Avonlea, Raymore is in Cupar and Wynyard will travel to Strasbourg to play the Maroons.

Provincial Schedules are listed under the Provincials tab. 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