The two things you can count on when you play hockey in Fox Creek is good goaltending and great refereeing.
The Jasper PeeWee Bears played two games there last weekend against the hometown Bulldogs and both games were a joy to behold, both for being very well-netminded and impressively reffed.
Goals are sweet, and I love a great passing play, but as a parent of a goaltender and a ref, I find a well reffed and tended game rivals both.
Game one on Saturday was the first league game of the season for the Bears and the learning started in the first period. Nothing is more compelling for young (and arguably old) hockey players than lifting the puck. Going top shelf feels great, however, it is equally rewarding for the goaltender to flash the leather. In this game, it was the netminders鈥� turn, and at both ends of the ice they were stoning the fancy high shooters.
It took Jasper鈥檚 Rhys Malcolm, a pure goal-scorer, to figure out that sliding the puck along the ice might work.
With two minutes to go in the first, he did just that. One nothing Bears.
In the second and third, the Bears continued to adapt, finding the back of the net by either sliding the puck on the ice or about a foot over it. In all, they tallied six more goals, including markers from the defensive pairing of Cooper Hilworth (2) and Drew Tank, two more from Malcolm and Eric MacMahon鈥檚 first.
For the first half of the game, Duncan McLeod was flawless between the pipes for the Bears, making a crucial goalmouth save early on to keep Jasper in it. Severin Golla took over from McLeod halfway through, and though he allowed two in the third period鈥攁 slapper off the faceoff and a ricochet off the post鈥攊t was good enough to lead the Bears to a 7鈥�2 victory.
Using the lessons learned on Saturday, Jasper used offensive zone passing and D-to-D feeds to move the puck against a determined Fox Creek squad.
Two and a half minutes in, Olivia Fonger fed Malcolm the puck and he made no mistake up high. One nothing Bears.
Malcolm鈥檚 second halfway through the first made it 2鈥�0 and, about a minute later, MacMahon made it three on a goal mouth scramble.
Troy Jackson scored his first of the season and Tank got his second on the weekend with only 4.5 seconds to go on a power play, giving the Bears a five nothing cushion heading into the second.
Six minutes into period two, Nathan Howes took a pass from Matteo Tassoni and converted on his backhand鈥攁 nice way to start his scoring season.
Then Hilworth potted another from a back-of-the-net pass from Malcolm. The Bulldogs got on the board with 32 seconds to play, ending the middle frame 7鈥�1 in favour of the Bears.
In the third, Malcolm scored three more, Jackson got his second and Hilworth tucked in his second of the game and fourth on the weekend, bringing Jasper up to 12 goals on the day.
Fox Creek got two more to round out at three, but the team was offensively outmatched by Jasper.
I wasn鈥檛 counting shots, but I鈥檇 wager the Bulldogs鈥� goalie saw in the neighbourhood of 50 in each game, and although he goes home with two losses on the weekend, he was a standout.
This early on in the season it is crucial that the umps set a strong tone and provide opportunities for the players and coaches to learn.
Jasper was assessed four minors for too-many-men-on-the-ice last weekend鈥攁n irony for a team with such a short bench鈥攂ut everyone learned the importance of puck management during changes.
Couple that with decisive line calls, no-nonsense body contact enforcement and consistent application of face-off rules, these were two of the best reffed games I鈥檝e seen.
Well done stripes. Your work alone was worth the trip to Fox Creek.
This Saturday the Bears are at home against Whitecourt. The action starts at 12:45 p.m.
John Wilmshurst
Special to the 51暗网
