January 27, 2017

IDAHO JUNIOR STEELHEADS KEEP PACE WITH LEAGUE’S TOP TEAMS

All of the top teams in the WSHL, including the Northwest Division-leading Idaho Junior Steelheads, swept their respective three game series last weekend,

At Manchester Ice, Coach John Olver’s club trounced the Seattle Totems by scores of 11-0, 9-0, and 7-2 to keep their five point lead in the standings over the Southern Oregon Spartans. 

The Spartans took three games from Bellingham; the Long Beach Bombers swept Phoenix and the Valencia Flyers took three from Las Vegas in the Western Division; both the Oklahoma City Blazers and El Paso Rhinos vanquished their opponents in the Midwest; the Colorado Eagles swept a home-and-home series against Cheyenne in the Mountain.  The Ogden Mustangs were idle.

The Junior Steelheads will take their 29 win, 2 loss, 3 overtime loss record  on the road against the up-and-coming Utah Outliers in West Valley City, Utah, February 3-5, then come home to McCall to host Ogden in a key three-game set February 10-12.

Olver said, “We did what we had to do against Seattle.  We’re glad we came through the weekend without any injuries, and now, after the idle weekend coming up, we can focus on the two very challenging series against the two Utah teams.  We can go to work to prepare for those six games.”

The Totems kept it close in the first period of each game last weekend, but the Junior Steelheads dominated play in the final two frames to come away with the one-sided victories.  It must be factored in that Seattle was playing with a “short bench.”  They had only 14 players, far from a full roster.  And, what a trip it was for them – due to weather and travel conditions, it took an excruciatingly long time for the team bus to make its way on Friday from Vancouver, Washington, where the team had actually defeated the Rangers 5-4 Thursday night utilizing 16 players.  Two of those 16 had to get back to Seattle for school exams

Friday, January 20

IDAHO 11, SEATTLE 0

After a 75 minute delay in getting the game started, the home team got the point parade going before 120 fans with goals within a minute of each other.  At 7:03, defenseman Kyrylo Zhovnir (Kiev, Ukraine) blistered a shot from the blue line inside the left shoulder of Seattle goaltender Liam Bohm-Meyer (Edmonton, Alberta).  A minute later, after a Totem slashing penalty, Matt Kindred (Garden City, Mich.)  took advantage with a power play goal for a 2-0 first period lead.

The floodgates opened in the second 20 minutes, as the Junior Steelheads pounded six goals, beginning at 5:01 with Fredrik Lindqvist  (Norrtälje, Sweden) notching his 10th of the season.  Jacob Hedencrona (Stockholm, Sweden) followed with his 16th at the 8:22 mark.  Zhovnir launched another blue-line special into the net at 10:48, and Oleg Losev got his 9th on a power play at 13:21 to make it 6-0.

This ended Bohm-Meyer’s night in goal, and he was replaced by Rasmus Mortensen (Odense, Denmark), who was making his first appearance since coming to the Totems from Utah.

The new netminder was greeted 100 seconds later by Losev’s second successive goal, and Lance Herning (St. Charles, Ill.) wrapped up the period with 1:02 left with another power play tally.

Herning did the déjà vu with another PPG 2:04 into the third period to make it 9-0.  Rei Kikuchi (Tomakomai, Japan) got the first of his three weekend goals 11:37 in, and Chris Hunt his first of three at 13:12 to make the final 11-0.

While the Junior Steelheads were firing 59 shots on the Seattle goalie tandem, Tyler Matthews (West Chester, Ohio) was turning aside all 11 shots he faced for his third shutout and ninth win of the year   Six of those shots were in the first period, a meager two in the second, and just three in the third.

Saturday January 21

IDAHO 9, SEATTLE 0

Saturday night, the Junior Steelheads did the Totems a favor, loaning them forwards Alex Piliya (Vitebsk, Belarus) and Dominic Puzevic (Mattawan, Mich.) and defenseman Kyle Hoffman (Issaquah, Wash.) for the final two games of the series.

The move brought back memories of the time when Junior Steelheads goaltender Victor Olafsson wound up playing goal for Seattle in a playoff game because of injuries to the two netminders they had for the contest.

On this night, before a crowd of 200, Matthews faced twice the shots (23) he had the night before, and he doubled his pleasure with shutout number four and win number 10.

Meanwhile, the Idaho team took 45 shots on Mortenson and his third period replacement Austin Alarcon (Corona, Calif.)

Tyler Berndt (Fond du Lac, Wisc.) scored 3:42 into the game after Chris Hunt (Albany, New York) made a great pass.  Then Hunt was the recipient of a Ty Cousineau (Minnetonka, Minn.) pass and scored his first goal of a productive seven point weekend.  The Junior Steelheads enjoyed the same 2-0 first period lead.

The wheels fell off for Seattle again in the second.  Hunter Lester (Boise) garnered his 11th goal of the year at 5:29, followed by Kikuchi and Hedencrona goals before the end of the period.

In the third, the Junior Steelheads got four goals within the first six minutes.  Jack York (Boise) got his first goal since re-joining the team at 1:02, followed by another Losev tally at 4:14, Kikuchi’s second of the game at 5:37, and a Herning marker just eight seconds later when the Seattle defense “coughed up” the puck.

13 different Idaho players got credit for assists in the second consecutive shutout.

Sunday January 22

IDAHO 7, SEATTLE 2

Sunday afternoon, before a crowd of about 100, the Totems got their first goal of the series, and it was loaned-player Puzevic who scored on Idaho goaltender Brenden Leise (Seattle, Wash.).

The Junior Steelheads tied it with a Berndt goal eight minutes in, then took a two goal lead on tallies by Kindred and Dylan Rallis (Minneapolis, Minn.).  Seattle cut the first period lead to 3-2 with a score with 21.7 seconds left in the frame.

It was all Junior Steelheads after that.  Kindred, Jacob Heza (Sternberk, Czech Republic), and Lester scored in the second period, and Hunt capped the weekend romp with a pretty shot from mid-zone to make the final 7-2.

Leise saved 19 of the 21 shots that came his way, and remained perfect on the season with his fourth victory.  The Junior Steelheads took 48 shots on Alarcon, who started and finished for the Totems.

In all, Olver’s boys amassed 27 goals and 52 assists on the series and, now having clinched a playoff spot,  will enjoy their last weekend off before their first-round playoff bye in the middle of March.

Submitted by Dick Dorfman  -  Jr. Steelheads Play-by-Play