Tag Archives: Anthony Ganoung

Glacier Kings Tidbits

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The Comox Valley Glacier Kings are on a two week break, at least the ones that didn’t play in the VIJHL all-star and Top Prospects games. This was a weird part of the schedule but I’ll get into that later. Things are back to normal now and the team is getting ready for its tilt against the Victoria Cougars tomorrow.

The team has been playing well lately and are working hard to try and keep that going. Head coach/GM Curtis Toneff has been looking at ways of keeping his club focused. It hasn’t worked out as well as he had hoped because of logistical problems. The coach talked about practices, “Last week we went back to skills and small area games. I thought it was a good opportunity to do that with the time off we have. We took a few days off at the all-star break. Our players got home from the all-star break late so they had to miss practice again because of cancelled flights. So now we have 2 practices leading up to the Victoria game Thursday which is a little bit less than you’d like but it’s a good opportunity for us to get back to our system play and game play and get our intensity up for the Cougars.” Glacier King players that were involved in the all-star game were Cameron Collins, Zaya Morro and Leon Mikhalchuk. The only player of the three to record a stat in the game was Mikhalchuk who got a 5-minute major for fighting against Jacob Bernardo of the Victoria Cougars late in the first period. Collins also played in the Top Prospects game and scored a goal. Westin Churchill collected 2 assists and Anthony Ganoung stopped 12 of 15 shots in his 30 minutes of action.

I was looking at some league stats yesterday and when I dug into special teams, it was so easy to see how important that part of the game is in this league. Did you know the top 4 teams in the league hold the top 4 power play percentages. And to prove the point even more, the top 3 teams in the VIJHL hold down the top 3 penalty killing percentages. Special teams are a huge part of the game and can quite often mean the difference between winning and losing. Comox is 7th on the PP and 6th when killing penalties. I asked the coach about this topic. He said, “When it comes to the power play, most teams have a number one unit and a number two unit. Our power play looks like it’s most successful when we do a little bit less by taking what’s given to us. We move the puck quick, we get inside the interior of the ice and get to the net a little bit. We’ve had some success on the power play as of late. The PK, we’ve been solid. There’s been some nights I think where we’ve given up 3 or 4 where its cost our percentage a little bit. Two or three of those games were by far out of reach or were put out of reach anyway. I agree that special teams are important but sometimes you have to look past that first and second layer and evaluate it closer. I think that at the end of the day we have the potential of having two great power play units and have the potential to be a top 2 or top 3 team on the PK as long as we can execute coming down the stretch and into the playoffs. I believe we have the tools to do so.” Newly acquired forward Easton Sangris should help out. In fact, he scored a PP goal in just his second game with the team on January 4th. Leon Mikhalchuk leads the squad with 6 goals with the man advantage which also places him in a tie for 6th place overall in that category.

Earlier I had mentioned that this was a weird part of the schedule. I say that because the Yeti had played 6 games in 12 days (Dec. 10-21). Since then, they play just 4 times in 31 days. That’s because after the Christmas break they only played 2 weekends before having another break in their schedule. It’s also in the midst of a 4-game road stretch. It’s really too bad because they have been playing well and racking up points. To be fair, part of the extended time off is in part due to the All-Star and Top Prospect games. The GKings have gone from 12-13-2-1 on December 10th to 18-14-4-1 right now. One has to hope that all this time off hasn’t hurt their momentum. The Glacier Kings bench boss says it’s not an ideal situation, “To be honest, it’s been quite annoying, we had a great Christmas break, we had played a lot of hockey before and to come and play 4 games and then head into another break is tough. It’s been positive in the sense of figuring out some of the logistics of some guys, having them settle in and as far as practicing and getting some chemistry built because we have made some moves of late. It’s a little annoying but after the first or second period Thursday night, it won’t matter anymore. Hopefully the rest restores itself. We have no excuses now.” Another weird part of the schedule is that the Cougars and Glacier Kings have only played once through the first 37 games and now play 3 times in 3 weeks. The first game didn’t go so well, hopefully this one will be different.

Darryl Skender

GKings Comeback Falls Short

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The Nanaimo Buccaneers scored three goals in the second period and held on for a 4-3 win over the Comox Valley Glacier Kings. The loss is the Glacier Kings second in a row and 3rd in their last 4 games while the Buccaneers won their 3rd straight and are now victorious in 5 of their last 6 contests.

It was a very even opening period which saw Nanaimo having a nice power play and with the Glacier Kings had big chances by Ethan Gobel and Westin Churchill. However it took almost 17 minutes before the first goal. Brandon Taylor took a shot from the point. It appeared that Westin Churchill may have got a stick on it to deflect it high in the air. The puck landed behind goaltender Aaron Pichette where Gavin Munro poked it into the net.

The lead wouldn’t last long. Less than 2 minutes later Jaxin Karst won an offensive zone faceoff. The puck would get tipped back to Dreyton Hayward at the blue line. The 5’9″ defenceman wristed a shot that went through a maze of bodies to beat Anthony Ganoung blocker side.

That goal made the score 1-1 and the period would end with that score. Shots were 11-7 in favor of Nanaimo.

In the second period, the Buccaneers would take their first lead of the game on an innocent looking play. Zach Spafford gave a 10 foot pass up to his own blue to Jack Barrett and by the time he got to center he skated between both defencemen to go in on a clear cut breakaway. Barrett quickly went backhand-forehand and beat Ganoung stick-side before the second period was three minutes old.

The Bucs made it 3-1 on a power play goal. Jaxin Karst won the faceoff and the puck subsequently never left the Glacier Kings zone after that. Madden Cruickshank eventually took a shot-pass to the side of the net where Porter Williamson deflected it behind the goalie.

Davis Young made it 4-1 with less than a minute to play in the 2nd period as he crept in from the blue line undetected and took a rink wide pass from Jaxin Karst and one-timed it between the arm and body of Ganoung.

The middle frame ended 4-1. Nanaimo outshot Comox 10-9.

Curtis Toneff must have fired the team up during the intermission because the Glacier Kings started off fast. After Nanaimo won the opening faceoff into their own zone, Comox Valley forechecked hard and Kyle Mayenburg did a good job keeping the puck in at the blue line. He directed the puck towards the net and a scramble ensued. Cameron Collins found a loose puck among the bodies and buried it past Pichette to make it 4-2.

That goal took 16 seconds from the drop of the puck. Unfortunately, the Yeti never got any momentum after that goal as Nanaimo tilted the ice afterwards dominating the play. However late in the 3rd period after Comox took a penalty, you could see that they were thinking offence. Cohen Kallin poked the puck off a Nanaimo stick at the Glacier Kings blue line then passed it up to Isaac Dunsire for a 2-man breakaway from center ice. Dunsire went in and snapped the puck past Pichette on the glove side for a shorthanded goal and it was suddenly 4-3.

Unfortunately the Yeti would take another penalty for “Too Many Men On The Ice” when they had possession inside the offensive zone with 19 seconds left. I’m guessing it was a good call because you could see the crowd and the Buccaneers bench pointing and yelling for a penalty. Pichette made a big save with 4 seconds left and that’s the way the game would end. Shots were 11-7 for the Bucs.

The win improves Nanaimo’s record to 11-5-1-0 for 23 points and are 3 points ahead of 2nd place Oceanside. Comox Valley drops to 7-9-2-1 for 17 points and remains in 4th place in the North. They will host the Oceanside Generals Saturday night. The Bucs are in Victoria on Sunday.

Other Observations:

  • Jaxin Karst had 3 assists to extend his point streak to 5 games (3G, 6A)
  • It took the Bucs 11 seconds to score their PP goal in the 2nd period after an offensive zone “Holding The Stick” penalty against the GKings.
  • Leon Mikhalchuk has 5G, 3A in his last 8 games.
  • The Yeti have only drawn 2 power plays in their last 200 minutes of hockey.
  • That was Gavin Munro’s first goal as a GKings player since coming over from Nanaimo. After his goal he pointed up to the stands at the NIC.
  • It was nice to see former Buc Brandon Taylor stick up for Thomas Scobie-Gyug after he got hit from behind. He went after the much bigger Rhys Wilcox who is 4″ taller and and 50 pounds heavier. He simply pushed him before getting into a scrum with Koen Gauthier where Taylor got his helmet taken off. I didn’t love that the referee making it a 4 on 4 instead of a PP for Comox.

  • Despite being outscored 3-0 in the second period, I thought it was a very even period. With that being said, I thought Nanaimo outplayed Comox in the 3rd despite being outscored 2-0.
  • Cameron Collins has 1G, 4A in his last 5 games.
  • Brandon Taylor picked up his first assist as a Glacier King with an assist.
  • The Yeti are 1-7-1-1 when trailing after the second period.
  • It is so refreshing to listen to Larenzo Jensen do play by play, a true professional, not biased, very descriptive. Good job Larenzo!

Darryl Skender

Comox – Nanaimo Preview

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Today couldn’t come fast enough for the Comox Valley Glacier Kings. After an 11-1 drubbing last Saturday night, they have been anxious to redeem themselves as quickly as possible. It will be a tough test however as they will be playing the best team in the VIJHL’s North Division. The Nanaimo Buccaneers come into the game with a solid 10-5-1-0 record which is one point ahead of the second place Oceanside Generals. Comox is 7-8-2-1 and 4th in the division. These two squad have played twice so far this season with both sides winning one game apiece. Nanaimo won on opening night (September 6th) 4-2 while the Yeti took the second match on September 27th by a score of 5-3. The Bucs are the highest scoring team in the North so it will be a tough task for a team that gave up so many goals in their last contest.

For the most part, the GKings penalty kill has been pretty good this season up until their last game when they gave up 4 goals on 5 Peninsula power plays. That dropped them from 1st to 8th place in the league. The power play has been streaky this year but has been non-existent the last couple games because they haven’t been getting any opportunities. In their past 2 games they have a total of 1 power play opportunity. I talked to head coach/GM Curtis Toneff about that. He says his club only have themselves to blame, “That should tell you a lot about our legs and our effort and our moving our feet. Any team in this league should have at least 4 power plays over the course of a game. I don’t think it was a ref thing either. It was our guys not working hard enough to draw any penalties. There was no second and third efforts. Sometimes those draw penalties. So in my opinion, that’s on our performance. I didn’t even love our performance on Friday night (in Lake Cowichan), I loved our finish but I didn’t love our performance on Friday overall.” The Buccaneers have the advantage in the special teams situations. Here is a look at the stats for each side:

Power Play
Nanaimo: 22.7% (3rd)
Comox Valley: 16.5% (8th)

Penalty Kill
Nanaimo: 84.3% (2nd)
Comox Valley: 81.7 (6th)

The Glacier Kings are desperate to get some scoring from anyone right now. One player that has shown he has an upside is Westin Churchill. Some games he looks like the best player on the ice than we don’t hear from him for a bit. Toneff says he likes what he can do offensively but knows he has more to do than what we’ve seen so far, “He’s a streaky scorer. Westin has shown a lot of flashes of someone that can do some damage in this league and be a difference maker. With Westin, he’s a busy kid, he goes to school, he works. For him it’s about managing his energy to be able to perform like that. He’s a guy who you can tell after 3 or 4 shifts if he’s going or not. And quite frankly he’s got to be going more than he has been this year. Points are great and all that but he’s got to be more consistent to be relied upon down the stretch night in and night out.” The consistency should come with maturity. Westin just turned 17 a month ago. He is 5th in team scoring with 4 goals and 5 assists.

The Bucs are led by Madden Cruickshank who has already amassed 9G, 15A in just 16 games so far. That ties him for 8th place among VIJHL scorers. Intersting, it’s a rookie 17 year old defenceman that is second on the team in scoring. Nate Barclay has been really good and very consistent. In fact he has at least 1 point in each of his last 8 games. That includes scoring 4G, 3A in his last 3 games… what!? In net, it’s former Glacier King Aaron Pichette getting the lionshare of the work. He sports a 6-3 record with a 2.41 GAA and .927 save percentage. That’s 4th and 3rd respectively in the entire league.

So Nanaimo has a better record, scores more goals, allows fewer goals and has better special teams than Comox Valley. They will definitely have their work cut out for them tonight. Curtis talked about what will be key for this evening, “It’s important to just not let anything slide any further. You have a terrible night last Saturday. It’s a chance for a bounce back, have a great first period as well as attitude and detail. I don’t know if there is any better place to do it than on the road against a divisional rival opponent. They’ll probably be looking to jump on us, jump on a team that is coming off a weak performance. We have to be ready to compete and get back to our game that helped us dig out of an 0-3 start. We have an even record with 90 percent of the league. It’s a good opportunity for us to get an upperhand on a season series against a good hockey club that’s done a great job this past year turning their trip around.” These two clubs will still have head to head match up once more in December, January and February.

A regulation win would move Comox within 2 points of the first place Bucs as well as propel them over Campbell River into sole possession of third place. As hard as I’ve been on the Glacier Kings lately, they are still well-positioned in the North Division. That’s due to winning 4 of their last 6 contests. A good start is paramount. Remember they gave up 6 goals in the first 11 minutes last Saturday. When the Yeti score first, they are 4-2-1 this season. Anthony Ganoung will get the start in net. Puck drop is at 7:15 PM at the NIC. Comox Valley’s line up for tonight is up on the Gameday Lineups page of this blog. Have a good one everybody!

Darryl Skender