Crunch exhibits winning form against Keith’s

Published on December 14th, 2008

Published on January 31st, 2010

Valley Keith’s lacked captain Eric Banks, out with a broken ankle from a pickup hockey game, but the team played a gritty game this afternoon against the Central division leaders, Harbour Crunch.

Although the Keith’s lost 7-1, they showed more consistent effort than in their 10-2 loss last week to Halifax Thunder.

The Crunch exited the first period leading 1-0 after a goal with 2:45 left on the clock, but the Keith’s had held them off the scoreboard almost all period.

The Crunch team has four of the top five goal scorers in the Central division—and the Junior C league’s top scorer is Kyle Hallett, who had 37 goals heading into today’s game.

Hallett managed to add only one in the Digby contest for one of his lowest scoring games of the season. His goal came early in the second period, the first of three for the Crunch in the period.

If Hallett’s scoring was almost shut down, the Crunch’s second leading scorer took up the slack. Kyle Miller got four goals on the night and Craig Ferguson added a pair.

Keith’s goalie Steve Morse made some excellent saves but was exposed too many times to breakaways.

At the other end of the rink, a two-on-one rush by the Keith’s in the second period came within a whisker of drawing the score within one of the Crunch, which was leading then 3-1.

Tristan Reede scored the Keith’s lone goal at 3:35 of the second, with assists going to Mike Mountan and Devon Bezanson.

The Keith’s did manage some superb penalty killing in the third period when they were at a two-man disadvantage for a minute and 10 seconds after consecutive holding penalties to Mike Peters and Mountan.

It was otherwise a remarkably clean game with just four penalties assessed each team.

Hallett had better fortune Saturday night in Parrsboro where he scored seven times to help the Crunch cruise to a 14-2 win over the Fundy Phantoms.

The Keith’s are on the road next weekend with games against South Shore on Saturday and Yarmouth on Sunday. The team is home again Dec. 28 for a 2 p.m. match with Yarmouth Mariners. Clare Lions

In Windsor on Saturday, the Lions got a pair of goals from Marc Lombard to lead a 7-1 win over Avon River Rats.

Singles came from Ryan Gallant, Jacques Lombard, Marc Andre d'Entremont, Luc Thibodeau and Stephane LeBlanc, and Colin Leblanc got the win in goal. Shots on goal were 37-26 for the Lions.