Coach's Corner
Jan 20, 2010, 7:56 amNARCh Winternationals
The Chico Firebirds 14U team participated in Winternationals in San Jose this last weekend. Our first game was at 7:40am against the Eschelon Puckhogs. Our team came out with a lot of passion and played one of the best first games we’ve ever played in a tournament. Everyone on our team contributed to our win of 5-0. Our defense only allowed 2 shots on goal, while our scoring was spread over 5 players. Garrett Anderson, Bryan Bruckman, Dylan Golet, Carson Malinowski and Benji Whitmore all scored goals while Gabe Wackerman and Dylan Golet both contributed assists. Our special teams play was excellent scoring on 3 out of 6 power plays and not allowing any goals on our penalty kill. What a start!
Our second game was against the Labeda XDH, the eventual Gold-level champion from Corona, California. Labeda is a platinum/gold level team and they showed it by handing us a mercy 0-8. A team like Labeda provides us with a glimpse at a team we aspire to be like; they were so smooth! This team was big and fast. We were able to hold them off until the second half before the 8th goal was scored. Our team never gave up and battled hard. Both coaches were extremely proud of our effort.
Our third game found us facing 949 Anarchy from Irvine, the other participant in the Gold-level championship game. What luck! We face the 2 finalists of the Gold championship out of our 3 qualifying games among 12 teams!! We battled this team well losing 3-6. We held the puck for the majority of the game; however, if we misplayed the puck once, they would exploit it. We got goals from Bryan Bruckman, Adam Steele and Benji Whitmore with Dylan also providing an assist. Again, our special teams played well. We got one goal from 2 power plays and did not allow a goal on our penalty kill which was actually a 4 on 2 penalty kill manned by Dylan and Gabe…amazing!
By going 1-2, we were seated 5th in the Silver division. Our quarter final game was against Team Hawaii; a team that mercied us 1-9 in the semi-finals in NARCh 2 years ago! Well, that was then and this is now! We came out in this game on fire! Hawaii is a fast team and our goalie, Charlie Robinson held the line!! The only goal he allowed was an incredible backhand shot. Hawaii had a good goalie, too. He made it hard for us and blocked many shots. We got goals from Dylan Golet and Adam Steele with Gabe Wackerman giving another assist. Although the score was close, 2-1, we controlled the game by playing good defense and passing well. If not for their goalie, we could have easily scored 5 more goals. I can’t express how proud we were of the boys in this game. We all entered the semifinals with high hopes!
The semifinals game pitted us against the Silicon Valley Quakes, a team that should have been in the Gold division with Labeda, Anarchy and the Riot. The Quakes had the same misfortune as us; playing 2 of the top 3 teams in the qualifier. We had a good game against the Quakes, losing 1-2 with Garrett Anderson scoring our lone goal! Again, we held the puck for the majority of the game. And again, we faced an excellent goalie and an excellent defense. We had a lot of energy but, we needed to put the puck in the net more.
This tournament gave us great hope for the future. Our passing game is greatly improved from the past. Our special teams performed well getting 4 goals on power plays and not allowing a goal on penalty kills. We also won the majority of face-offs. We only need to clean up our puck handling a little more and improve our accuracy on our shots and we will be pulling some victories from teams like the Quakes and Anarchy. Our boys never quit in a game and we are very proud of them! Go Chico!!
Jim Wackerman
PS Gabe Wackerman also played on a 12u team from Antioch. They won every game including the Squirt Gold Championship. Gabe was second leading scorer with 13 points (9 goals and 4 assists) in 5 games. All from the defenseman position. Way to go Gabe!
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