The game was already decided and there was nothing South Island Royals goalie Luke Sheldrake could do to change the fact the Cariboo Cougars were on their way to a 3-0 B.C. Hockey Major Midget League victory Sunday at Kin 1.
He was powerless to change the outcome but the 17-year-old goalie wasn’t about to stand idle while his younger brother lay flat on the back taking punches to his face.
With two minutes left to play, a scrum along the side boards turned nasty and Cariboo's Riley Krane and South Island's Matthew Baird dropped the gloves and started fighting. That touched off another scrap between Darian Long of the Cougars and Sean Sheldrake of the Royals. Long popped the 15-year-old Sheldrake in the chin and connected with a series of fists to the face when Luke Sheldrake decided he’d seen enough. He did what any big brother would do and jumped on Long’s back to break up the beating. As the third man in a fight, it’s going to cost Sheldrake a five-game suspension, but he had no regrets for his actions.
“I saw my younger brother Sean laying on the ice and I wasn’t going to let that happen, no matter what the consequences,” said Luke Sheldrake. “I’m really happy with the way I played until I got kicked out and I’m really happy with our team. (The Cougars) played awesome.”
It took the first-place Cougars 48 minutes to finally figure out a way to get through Luke Sheldrake’s armour. Tyler Maser opened the scoring 8:28 into the third period, pulling the trigger from the side of the net for his first goal since rejoining the Cougars last week from the BCHL’s Vernon Vipers.
“It’s good to be back with these guys,” said Maser. “I don’t know what it was but I just couldn’t bury the puck this weekend. I didn’t think I played very good the first game but this game it kind of changed. It was good to get the first one out of the way.
“(The Royals) are probably one of the hardest-working teams in the league but we just needed to pop one and the goals kept coming. We have a pretty solid group here and we’re doing a lot better than we were last year at this time. Hopefully the success continues."
The Cougars made it 2-0 not long after Maser's goal when Mason Richey snapped home a centring pass from Long. Joel Patsey completed the scoring late in the period with a power-play point shot.
The Cougars owned the puck in the third period, outshooting the Royals 23-2 in the final 20 minutes. They also dominated in the first two periods but Sheldrake held them off. The shot total favoured the Cougars 41-11.
“I thought our structure was good and our power play (which went 1-for-6) didn’t capitalize right off the bat like we needed, but kudos to them, their goalie made some really good saves that I think in other games would have been goals,” said Cougars head coach Trevor Sprague.
“The biggest thing for us was just sticking to team tactics and sticking to how hard we were working, getting pucks to the net. Tyler (Maser) probably could have had five goals this weekend if the goaltending wasn’t as good as it was. He clamped down and got a good goal today and we’re going to expect those things out of him.”
Cougars goalie Zach Wickson didn’t get much work but still had to be sharp to earn his second shutout of the season. He came up with his best save of the game with 6:50 left when he did the splits to rob defenceman Sean Strange on a redirected shot from close range.
The win kept the Cougars first in the league with a 9-1-0-0 record. The Royals dropped to 1-6-1-0. Royals assistant coach Randy Wong was impressed with his young team and how they held off the Cougars snipers for as long as they did Sunday.
“They’re deep, they’re a very good team and that’s why they’re hosting the Telus Cup (national midget championship),” said Wong, referring to the Cougars. “We’ve got 15 first-years, this is their first time playing major midget.”
On Saturday, the Cougars outshot the Royals 38-16 and were rewarded with a 4-1 victory. Devin Sutton, Reid Perepeluk, Joel Patsey and Daine DuBois scored for the Cougars. Bryson Hines was the only South Island shooter to beat goalie Marcus Allen. Connor Cheyne took the loss in net for the Royals.
LOOSE PUCKS: The Cougars hit the road this week heading for Kamloops, where they will take on the Thompson Blazers Saturday and Sunday… Krane and Long will likely be suspended for the series for taking part in Sunday’s fisticuffs... The Cougars were sporting a fresh new look in their new white jerseys trimmed with lime green highlights to mark the team’s involvement with the MindRight program to promote mental health for teens. The new colour scheme was striking but the Cougars wasted a chance to ditch the hard-to-read number font on the backs of their jerseys, something to remember for next time they plan a sweater redesign… The league has brought in a new three-on-three, five-minute overtime format. If the game is still tied after five minutes it goes in the books as a tie. Teams that lose in overtime will get one point. The problem with that is the league has no designation for overtime losses in its online standings. BC Hockey also needs to give its goalies some credit in the online summaries, which do not display shot totals or identify which goalie played in the game.
