You would think that the Head Coach would be thrilled after an 11-3 Storm victory on Sunday.
Lee Stone sounded anything but pleased following the game, “I’m really unhappy with our performance tonight. At the end of the day, 11 goals are great, good for the confidence, but I thought we left Smitty out to dry on more than a few occasions.”
Stone felt that as a team they didn’t defend well and that could be a problem in the playoffs, “When we win the championship, it isn’t going to be by scoring lots of goals, it’s going to be keeping the puck out of the net and I don’t think we did a good enough job of that today.”
He added that he felt his team didn’t play a full 60.
There were so many goals on Sunday that a bit of team history was missed. When Colin Blake was credited with his fourth assist of the night he tied Jason Jaques (2001 – 2004) for the most career assists in team history at 139.
A total of 11 players had multiple points on Sunday. Mitchell Williams (3G 1A), Blake (4A), Aaron Brewer (2G 1A) and Dylan McCann (2G) led the way.
Late in the game with the outcome in little doubt, Jaydlin Spooner took over the goaltending duties from Chris Smith. Last season, she played one game as an AP (Affiliated Player) and came away with a win. The VI Seals netminder was filling in for backup Zak Myrowich who was ill.
Smith (1.40 GAA) and Myrowich (1.82 GAA) own the best goaltending records in the VIJHL.
The Storm hosted two games on the weekend. In addition to the 11-3 win over Peninsula, the Storm mustered a 3-1 triumph over the Kerry Park Islanders.
It was clear that the Isles studied game film before Friday’s match. They shut the Storm down in the first period and held a 1-0 lead at the end of 20.
The home team had a much better second period but couldn’t solve Kerry Park backstop Chase Anderson until late in the frame. That’s when Blake scored a beautiful goal from the left circle through a crowd. Moments later Connor Bissett was skating out of his corner and directed a pass to a teammate that bounced off Carter Hikichi and through the legs of Anderson. That goal took the wind out of Kerry Park’s sails.
The Storm put the game away in the third period. Their final goal was set up by Captain Kobe Oishi who, through a scrum of players at the blueline, found a speedy Hikichi in the open.
It’ll be a week and a half before the Red and Black are back at the Brindy. On Friday they are in Saanich hoping to exact revenge for an 8-7 loss to the Braves early in the season. On Saturday night, they head to Mill Bay for an engagement with the Kerry Park Islanders.
Campbell River sports the best record in the VIJHL with 12 wins and 2 losses for a .857 win percentage which is second best in the province behind the KIJHL’s Creston Valley ThunderCats.
That’s the team that will be hosting this season’s Cyclone Taylor Cup in April.
It’s not going to be an easy road getting there. Unlike the past two seasons, there is parity in the league with the Comox Valley Glacier Kings (10-3) and Saanich Braves (9-5) having very strong seasons.
The Victoria Cougars got off to a slow start but seem to be back on track with an 8-3-0-2 record tied atop the South Division standings.