The Ridge Meadows Flames posted two lopsided wins to start a new season in the Pacific Junior Hockey League.
On Friday night, Sept. 6, on home ice at Cam Neely Arena, the Flames blasted the White Rock Whalers 9-1. The next night in Mission, last year's league champions routed the Outlaws 14-2.
Second-year forward Nolan Bowsher scored three of the first four goals on Friday night, to get a hat trick and the team's first hard hat award of the new season.
Rookies Owen Nutland and Dalton Toma had two goals and an assist, and so did perennial team scoring leader Theo Kochan.
"It feels great to win. I think we played the full 60, [got] pucks deep, shots on net, and got some rebounds and put them in the back of the net," Nutland said in an interview with the team's award-winning broadcaster Andrew Cheverie.
Nutland really went to town in Mission, as the hard hat winner on the night scored four goals and added an assist. A Maple Ridge kid, he now has six goals and eight points through his first two games in junior hockey, to lead not only his new team, but the entire PJHL in the very early going.
James Eagle, a rookie forward from Port Coquitlam, also had five points on a goal and four assists. Team captain and standout defenceman Lucas Ravenstein had two goals and two assists in that game. Veteran forwards Kochan (two goals and an assist), Bowsher, and Zack Lagrange (a goal and three assists each) all got their points.
There are 10 players from Maple Ridge and Pitt Meadows listed on the Outlaws roster, and rookie Ridge kid Colton Collard got his first junior goal for the Outlaws.
Elsewhere in the PJHL, the always tough Richmond Sockeyes also started with two lopsided wins, outscoring opponents by an aggregate 16-2. And the new franchise in Gibsons, the Coastal Tsunami, won their first two games.
The Flames now have almost a week off, and will play the Aldergrove Kodiaks on Sept. 13 at Cam Neely Arena. All home games start at 7:30 p.m.
