The Similkameen News Leader
Sports Page
COACH DUNER SAYS "I'M NOT DONE YET!"
Princeton hockey fans have already noticed their Junior B hockey team is not anything like it was last season, or the season before.
Going into last Friday (September 22) night's game against Revelstoke the Posse had four more new faces. They included Alex Young (O88) from Alaska who played Junior A with Langley Chiefs; John Webb (O87) from Florida who played with Summerland Sting last season; Spencer Holmes (O88) who wore a Posse jersey for a short time last season and Evan Karambelas (O89) a goalie who was property of Moose Jaw Warriors.
The game itself saw Revelstoke Grizzlies try to confuse players with a very impressive razzle-dazzle display of stick handling and fancy trick passes, which earned them two quick goals in the first period at 3:55 and 4:13.
The Posse, although looking a little rough in the first twenty minutes, managed a goal at 12:11 when Liam Darragh poked a rebound into the goal from just in front of the net.
It wasn't nearly as fancy as the Revelstoke passing play, but the goal counted. Assists went to Kyle L'Arrivee and Sean Carr.
The second period saw the Posse play improve and at 1:55 Garrett Pfiefer took advantage of the rebound from a shot on goal by Jeremy Wagner and fired it between the knees of the Grizzly goalie.
By mid-period, Revelstoke had three players in the penalty box to Princeton's one but the Posse couldn't produce on the power play.
Princeton's go ahead goal came at 5:24 when Mike Salter one-timed a missile shot off the rebound. Assists went to Dan Hillman and Alex Young.
Revelstoke, still energetic enough to keep up their razzle-dazzle stick games, scored what could have been their tying goal at 11:47 but was disallowed due to the high sticking portion of their passing skit.
They did finally tie the game at 3-all 3:41 into the third period.
At 5:02 Princeton's Dan Hillman was going in all alone until he was tripped by a Revelstoke Grizzly player with some of that fancy stick work. This led to a penalty shot where Hillman beat the Revelstoke goalie on the stick side.
This goal seemed to have an effect on the rest of the game and how Revelstoke played it.
Princeton also seemed to turn the juice up a notch and fought harder in the corners and in front of the net.
This proved to work as Kyle L'Arrivee scored his first Posse goal at 7:22 unassisted just by poking at the puck in front of the net and managing to get enough wood on it to flick it over the sprawled goalie.
Revelstoke added their final goal at 12:22 and although both teams played aggressively in the last five minutes of the game, with two time-outs, there was no more scoring.
Princeton's Jordan Lane spent a lot of time in the penalty box, collecting time for boarding, cross-checking and slashing. At one point in the game, after he had come out of the box, fans suggested Lane should just go to the bench.
Final score: Princeton 5, Revelstoke 4. Shots on goal: Revelstoke 37, Princeton 31.
