Season Wrap-up

The hockey season will be officially finished this Sunday with a non-league game.  We missed getting into the league playoffs by a tie-breaker for 4th place...the team that made we had beat once and lost once to, but they had a higher goal differential against us. :-( 

Pre-evaluation clinics start in mid-March and evaluations for next season are the second week of April, so we won't be without our "religion" for long.

And in between we will squeeze in the lacrosse season!

Winning weekend!

The team won both of their games last weekend: Saturday against the Junior Titans 6-1 and Sunday against the Little Flyers 2-1, and both were league games.  That brought the team up in the league standings:

LEAGUE STANDINGS FOR MIDGET 16 - AMERICAN Last Updated: 01-15-2013 09:41:06 AM

Team Name GP W L T OTL P W PCT Home Away GF GA LONG ISLAND ROYALS 17 11 4 2 0 24 0.706 6-1-1-0 5-3-1-0 79 48 TEAM COMCAST 21 10 7 2 2 24 0.571 7-3-0-1 3-4-2-1 67 60 NORTH JERSEY AVALANCHE 17 10 4 2 1 23 0.676 4-1-1-0 6-3-1-1 63 36 WB/SCRANTON JR. KNIGHTS 14 10 2 2 0 22 0.786 5-1-2-0 5-1-0-0 66 27 PHILADELPHIA JUNIOR FLYERS 17 9 5 3 0 21 0.618 6-2-1-0 3-3-2-0 71 58 NEW YORK SAINTS 21 10 11 0 0 20 0.476 6-5-0-0 4-6-0-0 65 88 PHILADELPHIA LITTLE FLYERS 18 9 8 1 0 19 0.528 3-6-0-0 6-2-1-0 52 48 TEAM MARYLAND 17 8 8 1 0 17 0.500 4-4-0-0 4-4-1-0 58 50 NEW JERSEY ROCKETS 16 8 8 0 0 16 0.500 5-4-0-0 3-4-0-0 42 56 JUNIOR TITANS 20 6 12 2 0 14 0.350 2-6-2-0 4-6-0-0 50 78 VALLEY FORGE MINUTEMEN 16 4 10 2 0 10 0.313 2-6-1-0 2-4-1-0 37 55 NEW JERSEY COLONIALS 20 3 15 1 1 8 0.200 1-6-1-1 2-9-0-0 45 91

We still have 5 league games to play, as well as 2 of the teams ahead of us in the standings, but 1 team only has 1 league game left, so we're looking pretty good to make it to playoffs!

Philly Frozen Cup

Zak's team participated in the Philly Frozen Cup tournament this weekend.  The games were played at the Flyers Skate Zones (Philadelphia Flyers practice facilities) in Pennsauken, NJ, and Voorhees, NJ.

Pennsauken, NJ

Voorhees, NJ

There were 5 other teams in our division:

Boston Bandits

Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Jr. Knights

Syracuse Stars

Team Comcast

Warwick Wildcats

We played 3 regular games: lost to the Syracuse Stars 4-0, tied the Warwick Wildcats 6-6, and lost to the Boston Bandits 4-1.  We were in the consolation game last night and lost to Team Comcast 3-2.  The boys played tough and never gave up, we are very proud of their performance!

Zak's girlfriend, Meesa, was even able to join for one of the games.

The coolest part is Peter Laviolette (the Flyers head coach) coaches his son's team (Team Comcast) which also includes Keith Primeau's son, and after the consolation game we were standing 6 feet away from Brian Boucher (former Flyers goalie).  :-)

Jr. Flyers Updates

The 2012-2013 hockey season is well underway....the team's first non-league games were in late August and league games started in mid-September.  The team has participated in 2 tournaments so far, 1 at home over Memorial Day Weekend and 1 in Boston in early September.  Their record is currently 7-4-3 in the league and they are in 5th place of 12 teams.

Tomorrow begins the Frozen Cup Tournament at the Flyers Skate Zone rinks in Voorhees, NJ, and Pennsauken, NJ.  We have 2 games tomorrow and 1 Saturday and playoffs begin Saturday evening.  Wish them luck!!!

Hockey Night In Boston

This summer, Zak was selected to play with Team Philadelphia in the Sophomore Division of the Hockey Night In Boston Tournament.  There were teams from across the country in the tournament.  The tournament took place July 15th-21st at Haverhill Valley Forum just outside of Boston, Massachusetts.

Haverhill Valley Forum

Team Philadelphia consisted of not only players from the Philadelphia area, but also 3 from Virginia, 1 from Florida, 1 from California, and 1 from Michigan.

Team Philadelphia Sophomores

Zak wore #8

Coach and his son

Coach Charlie Pens, who runs American Hockey Schools, has been taking teams to this tournament for years and has never won.  Well Zak's team changed that this year!  Not only did they win the championship, they went undefeated 6-0!!!

The smile of a champion!

Each player was rewarded with a Hockey Night in Boston "Festival Champions" jacket.

Moving Up!

Zak decided this year was the time to try and take a step up in his hockey career.

Let me give a little background first:

He has always played in what is called a Tier II league which has only required us to travel within about an hour and a half from our home rink for games, there are about 20 teams in this league each year, and their play levels are AA, A, and B.  Tier I league teams are very competitive, highly skilled, and can require travel up and down the east coast, there are only 3 teams within an hour and a half of our house, they are AAA, and are scouted by college and pro teams.  Additionally, youth ice hockey groups 2 birth years together each year into the following brackets: Atom, Mite, Squirt, PeeWee, Bantam, Midget U16, and Midget U18.

So, back to our story:

This season Zak is moving into a new age bracket, Midget U16, and since he seems to want to continue playing hockey hopefully into college if not further, we decided now was a good time for him to take the chance and try out for a Tier I team and if he didn't make it, no big deal because we love our Colonials family.  The tryouts were much more intense than he had ever experienced and the skill level of the boys was amazing.  Well, he made it...he is now a Jr. Flyer!!!

Way to go, buddy! We are so proud of you!!! We can't wait to see what exciting opportunities next season brings!

Saturday, February 4th, VFC vs. York Devils

This was the 4th time we played this team, and boy did we play them with a vengeance.  They have beat us the first 3 games, but we took the lead early and held on for a 6-1 win!  Zak got an assist, but most impressive was a mid-ice check he laid on a kid that was totally legal, but left the poor kid down on the ice.  When Zak sets his mind to it, he is like a human wrecking machine on the ice!