By Gary Moskalyk
One team hasn’t lost in regulation, another hasn’t won in regulation, the SIJHL has completed 20% of its regular season, and Kam River forward Carter Poddubny is hotter than the sun.
Poddubny has eight goals in his last three games, His last six have been on the powerplay.
Sioux Lookout won both games of a home and home with Dryden, taking over first place with 19 points and have a .950 winning percentage. Fort Frances battled the North Stars tight for two periods in two road games but lost both and haven’t won just yet.
Wisconsin claimed five of six points against Red Lake. Ethan Nietsch won a game in net for the Miners. His 2.42 GAA and .929 SV% are just too good.
Two Friday games, four Saturdays and two on Sunday grace week 6 in the SIJHL. Sioux Lookout battles Thunder Bay for three, Wisconsin journeys to Dryden for a pair, Kenora and Fort Frances tangle before the Islanders head off to Red Lake, and the Walleye head down to Fort Frances for a Saturday tilt.
Sioux Lookout Bombers 9-0-1 19 pts .950 1st GF 47 GA 22 +25 PIMs 207 PP% 33.3 PK% 92.2 at Thunder Bay 5-4-0 10 pts .556 5th GF 34 GA 26 +8 PIMs 154 PP% 14.3 PK% 85.4 Fri/Sat/Sun
The Bombers swept Dryden last week to reclaim first place. Led by the league’s top line of Owen Riffel/Blake Burke/Connor Burke and a powerplay screaming along at 33.3% the Bombers have yet to lose in regulation play. They’re in for a test this weekend, facing a North Stars team on home turf on a four-game roll of their own.
Riffel leads the SI in goals with 13, and points with 21. He was injured in his last game so his status is uncertain as of this writing. Blake Burke has 15 points (5G 10A) and Connor Burke has 13 (6G 7A).
Nolan Palmer and defenceman Dayvan Bull have 10 points each. Alex Lucas has seven points and forward Jonah Smith has five goals.
Jack Osmond has been stellar in net, going 5-0-1 with a 1.83 GAA and .948 SV% with two shutouts in 361 minutes. Matthew Spencer-Dahl and Michael Ofukany provide capable back-up. Spencer-Dahl is 2-0-0 in 125 minutes, while sporting a 1.92/.937 split. Ofukany is a tick off those marks but has two wins in his two starts.
The Bombers also have the best penalty kill at 92.2%. Sioux Lookout averages 20.7 minutes in the box. League average is 22.1.
Thunder Bay has a top line of their own. EJ Paddington is second in league scoring with 17 points (6G 11A). One point back is 16-year-old Easton Mikus with 10 goals and six helpers. Captain Edison Weeks has two goals and dished off nine. Newcomer Tyler Jordan has been a shot in the arm with seven points and four goals in just four games. Cohen Tangedahl has six points.
Keenan Marks and Ethan Barron have pretty much shared the goaltending duties. Marks has 295 minutes between the pipes, Barron 242. Both are sub 3.00 in goals against and over .900 in save percentage with Marks holding the edge in both categories.
Thunder Bay is the second least penalized team in the league at 17.1 minutes per game.
The Stars powerplay is only 14.3% but the penalty kill is 85.4%–above league average.
Expect a great three-game series between these two clubs at the Gardens.
Kenora 1-7-0 2 pts .125 7th GF 21 GA 62 -41 PIMs 258 PP% 12.5 PK% 63.8 at Fort Frances 0-8-1 1 pt .056 8th GF 13 GA 47 -34 PIMs 241 PP% 11.1 PK% 85.7 Friday
One of these teams is going to make some progress in the standings in this game. Kenora hasn’t won since game one, and Fort Frances is still looking for their first ‘W’ of the year.
The Islanders’ Aaron Bertschinger is in the top-20 in league scoring with nine points (6G 3A) in eight games. John Paul Scaringi has seven (1G 6A), Keanu Woodhouse six (1G 5A) and defenceman Darian Sinclair five (3G 2A). Kenora has 21 goals in eight games.
They’ve allowed 62 goals. Matthew Stephens has played in well in goal, securing a few three-star selections along the way. He’s among the league leaders in net time with 342 minutes. Stephens, Kaden King and Jero Rossi man the pipes for the Islanders.
Kenora also has the most penalty minutes per game at 32.2. The penalty kill is at 63.8%. It’s early, those numbers are likely to improve.
Fort Frances has scored just 13 goals in nine games. Brady Krentz has four games as a Laker and already leads the team in scoring with five points (2G 3A). Forward Trever Sanderson hasn’t played since September 23rd. Veterans Ryker Watt, Ian Snooks and Clark Scaddan are way overdue.
Goalie Jack Orchard was a key signing in the offseason. His 339 minutes in net are among the league leaders. Lukas Toth and Gunner Paradis serve as back-ups.
The Laker powerplay is at 11.1%. Their penalty kill is 85.7%, one of the bright spots on their resume at the moment. At 26.8 penalty minutes per game, their PK has come in handy.
Kenora at Red Lake 5-5-1 11 pts .500 4th GF 37 GA 32 +5 PIMs 179 PP% 10.3 PK% 81.8 Saturday
The Miners were on a four-game schneid until their amazing two-goal late comeback win in overtime against Wisconsin in Spooner on Sunday. The Miners have a one-point lead over Thunder Bay for fourth place, but the Stars have two games in hand.
Noah Tenney leads the team in points with 10 (4G 6A). Luke DeCorby and Blake Hiltermann have eight points and four goals each. Aiden Corbett has seven points (4G 3A) as does Bryson Carlyle (1G 6A). Landon von Engelen, Jared Burnett, Gabe Tanton and Gavin McIntosh have six points each.
Former primary goalie Trent Boryszczuk is not on the official roster. Ethan Neitsch has been stellar, if unrewarded, in net with a 2.42 GAA and .929 SV%. Newcomer Noah Davis has a win in relief in 87 minutes.
Red Lake has 179 penalty minutes in 11 games–16.3 minutes per game.
The Miners have only scored six powerplay goals and have allowed three while up a man. The penalty kill is 81.8%. League average is 81.3%.
A light schedule next week for the Miners.
Kam River 8-2-0 16 pts .800 3rd GF 56 GA 28 +28 PIMs 213 PP% 26.0 PK% 82.2 at Fort Frances
The Walleye are averaging 5.6 goals per game, allowing exactly half that, have the league’s second best powerplay (26.0) . . . the list goes on. Dryden took a 5-3 decision last Wednesday, but Kam River served notice in Kenora and are back on track.
Four Walleye are in the top-10 in scoring led by Poddubny with nine goals and five assists. Jett Mintenko has 13 points (7G 6A) and Jeremy Dunmore and Brydon Bell have four goals and eight assists each.
Seven more Walleye are in the 21-40 range in league rankings for point production. Daxton Lang, Kaden Goodwin, Riley Borody and Edwin Liang have nine, Max Wright has eight and Liam Bell seven. Pretty much any player head coach Jesse Messier taps on the shoulder is a scoring threat.
Ashton Sadauskas is 5-1-0 in net and Travis VanderZwaag is 3-1-0.
Kam River is league average at 21.3 penalty minutes per game.
Wisconsin 3-5-3 9 pts .409 6th GF 33 GA 49 -16 PIMs 222 PP% 13.3 PK% 83.9 at Dryden 9-3-0 18 pts .750 2nd GF 52 GA 27 +25 PIMs 293 PP% 23.2 PK% 79.2 Sat/Sun
Wisconsin took two of three from visiting Red Lake, snagging an overtime point in game three for a five-point haul. They’re within a point of Thunder Bay and two from the Miners for 4th place.
Dryden will likely be in a surly mood after losing a pair to Sioux Lookout.
Last year the Lumberjacks dominated league scoring. This year, not so much. Connor Corcoran and Ryan Kayser sit in 27th and 28th place in the scoring race with nine points. Koen Burkholder and Kaden Postal have seven each. Marshall Thomas and Zach Johnson have five.
Goalie William Forrester’s 339 minutes, 3-2-1 record, 3.37 GAA and .905 SV% establish him as the number one man in net. Jakob Barcelona (215 minutes) and Rylen Freshwater (115 minutes) round out the goaltending corps.
Wisconsin scored three powerplay goals in one game against Red Lake on the weekend to boost their PP to 13.3%. They’ve scored eight while up a man, but allowed four. Their penalty kill is above league average at 83.9%.
The Ice Dogs will provide a good test for the Lumberjacks this weekend.
Dryden took down Kam River, but lost two to Sioux Lookout in an early battle for first place.
With 52 goals for and 27 against in 12 games there’s plenty to like on the Ice Dogs.
Max Roby continues where he left off last year. He has 10 goals in 12 games. Last year he had 18 in 31 games. Roby’s 15 points place him 4th in league scoring.
Carson Devine is averaging a point a game (3G 9A 12GP). Bryce Benfield has six goals and four assists in just seven games. Defenceman Sebastiano Biagi has 10 points (3G 7A). Sean Smith, Kaden Bandura and captain Geoff Bjarnason have nine each. Eli Antoine has eight, and McLaren Paulsen seven.
Bjarnason, a defenceman, is 6’9″, 215-lb, and leads the SIJHL in penalty minutes with 54. All four of his goals have been on the powerplay.
Ewan Soutar has allowed six goals in five games for a sparkling league-leading 1.20 GAA and .957 SV%. The Regina, SK native has two shutouts and four wins against a loss. Partner Michael O’Sullivan has logged more minutes, 361 to 299, and has four wins and two losses with a 3.16 GAA and .900 SV%.
The Dogs are only a minor penalty above league average for penalty minutes per game.
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