Tuesday 9 February 2016

The Weekly Roundup



Tuesday Feb 9 7PM
The Riders played three games last weekend, they won 4-2 in Kimberley, lost 3-1 at home to Creston (1 EN Goal) then lost 2-0 to Kimberley at home on Monday... again with 1 empty net goal.

Brandon Butler got the win in Kimberley and Jeff Orser was in net for the other games surrendering just 3 goals.

The injured Riders, (Cheveldave, Keebler, Haugo and now Justin Peers and possibly Ryan Kennedy after a 5 minute hit from behind by Austyn Moser Monday afternoon) just couldn't beat Tyson Brouwer who had his 7th shutout Monday.

Good turnout Monday at 2 PM about 500 fans and an area full of kids after the game for the Skate With the Riders event.

The Ghost really needed another win last weekend, especially since they got a bit of a break when the Rockies lost what shoulda bin a gimme game in Spokane last Friday. The Rockies did win on Saturday and finished the weekend just 2 points behind the Riders. They play Golden, twice starting on the 9th,  a road game here in Fernie on Friday and a home and home with Creston to finish off the season.

The Riders have a somewhat more ominous schedule with games against the Rockies, Golden, Beaver Valley, and Kimberley twice.

It's always fun when Kimbo is around and both games against them were full of action. Monday's game would have been considered a hard game to ref if you were an evaluator. There were almost constant hits to players with or without the puck, slashes to the hands, hi sticks and hits from behind, but all in all, not many PIM's called... I've seen games with all that and a couple of line brawls as well, the game needed the two referee system but there are not enough referees to go around.

Nolan Lagace's biggest fan watching the game


This'n That

Rider Coach Craig Mohr was kicked out of Monday's game for arguing and pointing out that Mack Differenz had lost some teeth from an uncalled high stick. What the ref didn't know was, that was the second time he'd lost teeth playing Kimberley and the second time there was no call, so you can see why Mohr was pissed... I get that the refs have to kick out a coach once in a while, but this year the refs have an Abuse of Officials Call they can use if they want and it is an automatic 2 games suspension. Credit to Monday's ref for not using it and he just kicked  him out.  Every once in a while you see a coach go completely berserk and that is when the Abuse Call should be made. We also saw Nitro Coach Jerry Bancks waving his arms and barking at the ref as well.. no one was happy, cept for the fans.

In Kimberley Dan Burgess, Keagan Kingwell, Evan Reid and Justin Peers scored the first 4 goals and the Riders hung on for the win, infuriating the fans. After a disallowed goal someone (and we hear he's related to a Nitro player) threw a garbage can full of bottles etc on the ice.  I was howling with laughter,  I hadn't seen that in years !
He was probably thinking... well THEY throw chickens on the ice... Anyway, being the first one in your family to walk upright  gives you some sort of poetic licence, or something, to throw stuff ...I guess... lucky there were no dwarfs in the crowd.

Those same fans were also throwing beer at the players and referee as well, with, impunity as far a security was concerned, as is normal in Kimberley. We heard that the referee infuriated them at the end of the game as well...

Jason Richter (96) is the latest Nitro to commit to the University of Jamestown, he's going there with 95's Justin Meier, Tyson Brouwer and Eric Buckley.

Sixteen year old female AP goalie  year old Jaydlin Spooner got the call, and a win, last weekend playing a game for the Campbell River Storm. The Storm won everything there is to win at the Junior B Level last season. I wonder if she got a call from Shannon Szabodos who played 3 seasons in the AJHL  and is now in the SPHL

More sixteen year old news... Tom Renny and his pals at Hockey Canada want to take our 16 year old players away from us and put them in some sort of a super league. The result around the East Kootenay is that it will make it even more expensive for parents, you can't have a team in every town so most players will have to be billeted... like in Major Midget or whatever they call it that was forced on the world a few years ago.  In Vancouver where you won't have to billet  it may work. Read that here  


After watching the football game on Sunday with my Honduran son in law we went down to the Rider- Kimberley game on Monday. After a particularly hostile exchange of punches and cheap shots by both teams behind the Nitro net he said… “Is way better than Super Bowl"

Well you don’t see this very often, a couple of weeks ago the Nelson Leafs and Castlegar Rebels had a ton'o of fights at the same stoppage of play resulting in several suspensions. As usual both teams had their own slant on the festivities. You can read that amusing story right here
Anyway Nelson appealed the suspensions and they were vindicated and the Rebels suspensions stayed the same, you can read that story right here  

So nice a job by the KIJHL and BC Hockey Referee in Chief Sean Papheal for watching the video and changing their minds. I'm here to tell you that most of the time, in spite of what the video says, they rarely change their tune. Anyway....  Here's what's left of the suspensions.




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