Ice jump into WHL lead

For HockeyNow

Ice down Winterhawks, Rebels for WHL lead

by Jeff Bromley

If defense wins championships, the Kootenay Ice are following the axiom to the letter. 16 games into the 2011-12 season the WHL’s stingiest defense at 1.94 goals against per game finds themselves the same spot they left off last May; on top of the WHL leader board with a 11-3-0-2 record and 24 points.

On Saturday the Ice cemented that position with a hard-fought, 4-1 win over the Portland Winterhawks in a rematch of last May’s WHL Championship. The prior Wednesday saw the Ice build a 3-0 lead and hold on to win 3-2 over the Red Deer Rebels. The two wins pushed the club’s win streak to four straight on top of a home record that’s now 8-1 at the Rec Plex. The lack of offence by the club – Saturday’s 4-1 win was only the third time the club has scored four or more goals in a game this season – doesn’t bother the club’s head coach, because they’re winning. “We have had the opportunities to score, which would make the games a lot easier for us but they haven’t been going in, in bunches,” said Ice head coach Kris Knoblauch. “When we need to score though, we get the job done.”

The need for secondary scoring beyond the top line of Max Reinhart, Jesse Ismond and Drew Czerwonka clearly evident, the solution is starting to present itself for the club as the line of Sam Reinhart, Joe Antilla and Elgin Pearce chipped in with two goals and four helpers in wins over Calgary and Red Deer while Erik Benoit, 18, on the third unit, notched two goals against the Winterhawks Saturday night. “That's two games in a row where they've been really good," Knoblauch said of the Antilla, Pearce and Sam Reinhart trio. "And I believe they were our best line (against Calgary and Red Deer).”

With the return of Drew Czerwonka, 19, from a shoulder injury suffered at the Edmonton Oiler training camp that forced the club’s captain to miss the season’s first eight games, the Glenavon, Saskatchewan native has helped solidify the club’s depth, notching 5 goals and 3 assists in the 8 games he’s played. “We’ve played together for four years now and there’s certainly some chemistry,” said Czerwonka of his linemates Max Reinhart, who made the club as 16-year-olds and Jesse Ismond, who joined the club at 17. “The offence is going to come, we’re getting the chances and the goals are going to come. We’ll just continue to play good team defense and the rest will sort itself out.”

Pearce and the younger Reinhart, who doesn’t turn 16 until November 6, have got some chemistry going with 20-year-old linemate Joe Antilla, forming an all-Lower Mainland unit. “Both those guys are easy to play on a line with,” said Pearce, a 19-year-old Port Coquitlam product who is starting to fill the net with 4 goals and 5 assists this season. “Joe is strong along the boards and gets you the puck and Sam doesn’t play like he’s only 15, for sure.”

“The chemistry is starting to build up between us pretty well,” said Sam, the youngest of the three Reinhart brothers playing the WHL. “We played well together in Calgary and half the game in Medicine Hat before that, so it seems that we're making some good plays coming out of our zone that really help us in the offensive zone so it's been going really well.”

Quick Hits – Ice goaltender Nathan Lieuwen is the WHL goaltender of the month for September and October. Lieuwen leads all WHL goaltenders in save percentage with .948, averaging over 30 shots per game, and goals against average with 1.45 and a 9-2-0-2 record on the season... Ice D Luke Paulsen left the game Saturday after colliding with another player in the warm-up and, after trying to play, not being able to continue. He is listed as day-to-day with an upper body injury... The club’s leading scorer, Max Reinhart with 8 goals and 11 assists in 14 games this season, was named to the CHL Subway Super Series team in the WHL vs Russia portion of the event that will play the last two games of the six-game set against the Russians November 16 and 17 in Moose Jaw and Regina. The series is a Hockey Canada identifier for hopefuls with World Junior aspirations for the national junior team invitational camp in December. Reinhart will play in both games… Kootenay continues their seven-game home stand Friday with the Everett Silvertips in town and Saturday when the Red Deer Rebels are in Cranbrook. The Everett line-up will feature Cranbrook Minor Hockey product Ryan Chynoweth, 16, the son of Ice GM Jeff Chynoweth, in his first WHL action in his hometown.