Standings after January 6th
1. Eagles 2 (14-2)
2. Bear Claw 2 (13-1)
3. Knights 2 (9-6)
4. Yeti 0 (6-9)
5. Walkers 0 (1-13)
6. Hounds 0 (2-14)
7. Colonials Bye
The XHL kicked off its 24th season last night with the Bear Claw defeating the Walkers 13-1. Prior to the game, Brice Miller said that he was looking forward to playing against his former team (jokingly saying it was a revenge game). Its safe to say that he was ready to play by scoring 4 goals including one just a couple minutes into the game to set the tone. The first goal came off a rebound on a nice shot from Vinnie Deloia. Vinnie later added a couple goals for his new team. Aside from Brice Miller, Laken Dodd scored 4 times including their 2nd goal of the game shortly after Brice scored the first goal. A 5-0 lead after the first period stretched into an even bigger lead as the 2nd period went on. The Walkers were playing without Troy Gaydosh last night and they should improve more and more as the season goes on. Jeremy Johnson will be available for about 5 or 6 games throughout the season. For anyone who remembers anything about the early days of the xhl knows that Jeremy Johnson has a lot of championship experience. Expectations wont be quite that high, but they have a good enough roster to give some of the best teams a good challenge. If last night is any indication for the rest of the season, it looks like the Bear Claw could be a tough challenge for even the leagues best teams as the season goes on. They have some early season matchups against the Colonials and Eagles which will give us a good indication of what kind of team they will be. Zach Foradori jumped from the Eagles to the Bear Claw and will look forward to going up against his former team on his birthday of all days. While he is trying to play a more defensive role, he can still bring some offense to the team along with Brice, Anthony, Vinnie and Laken. Kaden kept a shutout going late into the 2nd period before the walkers finally scored on him. The Bear Claw had a good balance of scoring (Brice 4, Laken 4, Vinnie 2, Zach 2, we don’t remember the other one). The walkers will look for a better game when they go up against the eagles next week while the bear claw will see where they are at when they go up against the colonials.
In some ways, it probably feels like it came 8 months too late, but the Knights defeated the Yeti 9-6 to open up their season last night. This time, there was no yeti comeback magic, even though they quietly kept hanging around when the Knights got ahead last night. The first period started out fast with the teams combining for 6 goals the first half of the game. Believe it or not, the Knights were missing Andy last night but they have Brandon Reiter back after having to play the entire season in Brockway without him. His presence made an immediate difference despite no hockey action since that championship game loss last spring. Dave Jewell, Derik Day and RJ did not play in the fall league and had not seen hockey action since their championship in Brockway back in late August. It may take them a couple weeks to rediscover their championship magic, but it’s a 12 game regular season with 2 more of those games going up against the Knights. The Knights don’t have Rooster this season but they replaced him with Jason Stamler. Stamler played at a high level this fall and carried that over to last night’s game by scoring a couple big goals for his new team. Noah Kline continues to get better each week and played a big part in last nights win over the Yeti. We saw our share of Kline/Reiter connection last night. Clint also played a solid game for the Knights in their win last night. The game may have been all summed up when Noah skated past Derik and Dave, went for the between the legs breakaway that got denied by Adam but the ball bounced right to Nate Galentine for an easy goal. The yeti had a wide variety of scorers last night with RJ scoring early in the first period in a losing effort. Braxton scored in his first xhl game last night and also skated out for the Hounds in the last game to help round out their lineup. Zach Smith was last year’s championship hero but the Knights did a pretty good job of containing him in last nights rematch. He still scored but there was no chance for a game winner last night. Dave Jewell scored last night as well but there was no chance of a tying goal with 15 seconds to go last night (we all remember his tying goal against the Knights in game 3 last year). It was an abbreviated matchup considering Cody and Kevin weren’t there for the Yeti last night and Andy wasn’t there for the Knights. It will feel like an all star game when each team has a full lineup. This is only game 1 of what could be 5 or 6 between these 2 teams before the championship is decided 4 months from now. The knights will be off next week before going up against the Bear Claw in 2 weeks from now. The Yeti will look to bounce back when they go up against the Hounds next week.
What was the bigger win for the Eagles last night? Was it their 14-2 win over the hounds or was it walking off the court last night with no more injuries? Jerred Amick stood aside his teammates bench area and cheered on his new teammate, Josh Clontz. After all, Josh Clontz was skating on the court with Jerred Amick’s jersey and quickly picked up Jerred Amick’s habits by leading the way offensively with 7 goals and 2 assists. Not a bad night for someone they just picked up a couple weeks before the season started. The Eagles found themselves up 5-0 at the end of the first period and the lead grew to 9-0 by the end of the 2nd. Eric Llewellyn played through an injury that he suffered outside the court area in last week’s Christmas/New Years tournament. He contributed his share of goals in last nights win over the Hounds. Tyler Waltman scored twice for the Hounds early in the 3rd period but the Eagles would score the next 5 goals to clinch a mercy rule victory. They were playing without Jerred Amick or Zac Gray. We will probably see both in the lineup late this month or early next month depending on how quick their injuries heal. The Hounds were missing Tyler Stitt and might get Garrett Britton on the roster to give them more bodies in addition to Tyler Waltman, Tyler Stitt, Jaron Buffone, Andrew Britton and Cody Haag. The McKinley’s seem willing to continue skating out for them to help out. Bubba made some good saves but also gave up 14 goals. Henry Sutter was not quite as busy as Bubba but he made some good saves early in the game for his team. The Eagles will look to keep their momentum going against the walkers next week while the hounds will go up against the Yeti.
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