The Delta Ice Hawks are in top spot in the Tom Shaw Conference standings as the team hits the quarter mark of their 2024/25 Pacific Junior Hockey League (PJHL) season.
Last Tuesday (Oct. 8), the Ice Hawks hit the double-digit win mark improving to 10-4 win an 8-2 win over the expansion Coastal Tsunami.
The Hawks outshot the visitors from the Sunshine Coast 60-18.
The game marked number 100 for captain Tye Hemenway’s PJHL career, and his team did him proud to make it a special win for him.
The Hawks got going early, scoring on their first two shots of the game.
Ryden Mathieson streaked in down the right wing from the blue line and fired a beautiful shot over goalie Finn Morrison’s blocker-side shoulder.
Then about 30 seconds later, Lucas Jakubec picked up a rebound-out front from a Brandon Petrie shot and was able to send it to the back of the net for a quick 2-0 lead.
Coastal cut the lead in half before the midway point of the period, with Ethan Smid finishing off a bit of a scramble out front of Delta’s net to make it a 2-1 after one.
In the second, Mathieson again struck within the first minute, redirecting a point shot from Hemenway past Morrison to reclaim the Hawks’ two-goal lead.
It was Mathieson’s eighth of the season.
Mathieson was involved in Delta’s fourth goal of the game as well, as he went in looking for the hat trick and was denied, but league-leading goal scorer Mateo Sjoberg was there to clean up the rebound to make it 4-1 through 40 minutes.
Delta added on in the third period, first while they were short-handed. Beckett Cross took the puck from centre and, while fighting off some tight defence, was able to get a shot up and over the left shoulder of Morrison for the goal of the night, his sixth of the season.
Not long after that, Miller Bruckshaw sent Teegan Sara and Chayse Hainz on a 2-on-1, and Hainz finished off the play by putting in the rebound for his second goal of the year and a 6-1 Hawks lead.
Tsunami’s Ben Walker scored a power play goal for Coastal, his second goal in two games against his former team to make it 6-2, but the Hawks fired right back.
Defenceman Miller Bruckshaw scored his first goal in the PJHL while on the power play, thanks to a pass from Declan Warburton and a helpful bounce off a skate out front to make it a 7-2 game.
Brogan Kennedy rounded out the scoring with a fortunate bounce of his own, flipping it up onto the shoulder of Morrison and it rolled behind into over the goal line.
After 14 games, Sjoberg leads the Hawks and the league in scoring with 16 goals and 13 assists.
Zach Shaughnessey has had the lions share of starts in goal, sporting a 7-4 record with a 3.26 GAA. Merik Erickson is 2-0 between the pipes while rookie Imaree Dhaliwal picked up one win in his only start so far.
Head coach and general manager Steve Robinson said he is pleased with the start, but knows it is a long season with much more work ahead.
“We’re building and starting to get a feel of the roster, the new guys and the returning guys and where they all fit,” said Robinson. “We are waiting for a couple of guys to come back from injury and that will solidify our depth and help us figure out what our combinations will be, but overall, I’m satisfied that we are growing and building the right way.”
Robinson said he is seeing more buy-in from the team to move the puck better and quicker in certain areas, which is a key to team success moving forward.
“Finding more speed in our game and avoiding dumb penalties that keeps the game 5-5 or at least us having an advantage is key,” he said. “Just recognition of having long stretches of domination and then we have a brain cramp, and we give up an odd man rush, or a breakaway unnecessarily are things we need to work on. And I’d like to see the power play get connected and executed better. We need to move the puck quickly, get to the net and crash – I think the power play will click too.”
Delta had a game Friday night (Oct. 11) in Surrey and played host to Surrey on Oct. 15.
The Ice Hawks next home game is Oct. 22 when they host Richmond at 7:35 p.m. at the Ladner Leisure Centre.
-With files from Katie Lawrence-Balloch
