The 2012/13 Royal LePage midget Tyee season officially got underway Saturday afternoon with the first of five placement round games.
Game 1 in was away against the Comox Valley A1 team. The teams came out fast and aggressive with several bone rattling hits by both squads. However, Comox crossed the line and found themselves a man short. The Tyees took only 15 seconds into the power play to score their first of the season on a shot from D man Brayden McCartney.
The physical play continued with both teams continuing to throw punishing hits.
Comox continued taking penalties however the Tyees couldn’t make them pay. And as all too often happens the penalties turned and the Tyees found themselves down two men. Several close calls but great tending by first year Tyee Riley Matheson kept Comox off the scoreboard. Late in the second Comox got on the board with a power play goal of their own. The Tyees kept pushing and on some good down low work Gavin Rauser hit a pinching McCartney with a quick pass and he made no mistake hitting the top corner short side with his second of the game and what would turn out as the game winner on a 2-1 final. Winning his midget coaching debut was coach Aaron Robertson.
Sunday afternoon the Royal LePage midget Tyees made their home debut hosting the Oceanside Generals midget team.
Parksville opened the scoring at the five minute mark with a slow-moving ping-pong point shot that found its way into the net. Tyees responded with their own ping pong goal six minutes later on the power play. A centering pass from Kurtis Scriba deflecting in off an Oceanside d-man knotted the score after one.
A hard working, strong fore checking shift resulted in a backhand chip shot by Tyler Clark giving the Tyees a 2-1 lead and then late in the second, while killing a penalty, Gavin Rauser blocked a point shot and was off on a breakaway making no mistake putting the Tyees up by a pair. However Oceanside was able to get that back four minutes later on a nice deflection into the top corner. Midway through the third on a nice individual effort from Gage Crawford the Tyees went up again by two and held off Oceaside, making the final 4-2 and a good start to the season.