Post Game: Trail 7 Prince George 3

Prince George, BC – The line of Scott Jacklin, Tye Lewis and Sam Mellor combined for 8 points in Trail's (7-18-1-1) 7-3 win over Prince George (10-16-1-1). Darnell Dyck, Paul Mailey and Mitch Kaufmann also added 2 points each in the victory.

Garrett Beckwith was sharp with 31 saves for the Smokies. He was really tested early as Trail was on their heels in the first ten minutes. Prince George out shot the Smokies 15-8 in the first period, but Nick Sandor's goal made sure the Spruce Kings only had a 2-1 lead after one.

Mellor's power play goal early in the second period was the first of six unanswered markers for Trail. Steve Koshey put the Smoke Eaters ahead for the first time when he snuck in from the point and tapped in a great feed from Jacklin. Koshey played and was very effective despite being a game time decision after an injury in Vernon.

Kyle Nielson replaced Steve Papciak in the Prince George goal to start the third period.

Mike Betz knocked in the rebound from a Paul Mailey shot to score his first career BCHL goal. It would stand up as the eventual winner. Mellor scored his second of the game on some great passing from Jacklin and Lewis. Sean Nugent also converted after a terrific pass from Tommy Rizzardo.

The Smokies closed out their scoring as Darnell Dyck used some quick hands to tuck a puck in at the side of the Spruce Kings net. Affiliate player Philip Patenaude got his first assist on the play.

Lyndon Martel, Stewart Lambert and Wes McLeod scored for Prince George.

ON THE TRAIL: This was Trail's final game in Prince George this season. The Smokies lead the season series 2-1. The teams will play again next week in Trail ... Matt Wilkins and Graeme Strukoff missed the game with injuries ... Patenaude was at Trail's training camp in August. He had 14 points in 18 games with Nelson in the KIJHL. The Smokies also have AP defenceman Colton Semenok with them for the weekend trip. He played a season with Canmore in the AJHL and has 3 assists in 14 games with Beaver Valley in the KIJHL ... Trail visits Quesnel on Friday night and Williams Lake on Saturday.

Click here for the boxscore

DeKeyser and Youngson Interviews

Danny DeKeyser on his scholarship

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Smokies Assistant Coach Brian Youngson on Vernon games

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Great to have a chance to catch up with Danny and I know everyone in the organization is really happy for him. Not my best performance in the interview as I was severely groggy this morning. Unusual for me to have trouble sleeping like I have this week. Got a big bus trip to correct that. We hit the road tomorrow morning for the second and final northern road trip of the season. After Saturday Trail will have finished 2/3 of their road schedule in only 29 games. There's a big long home stand just around the corner. Once we make it into the hotel in Quesnel I'll probably have an update tomorrow night on whether or not any extra bodies were needed and are coming on the trip. I'll also have details and audio on two pretty big stories for the KIJHL's Beaver Valley Nitehawks. 16 year old forward Aaron Hadley has been named to Team Pacific for the World Under 17 Challenge and the Nitehawks have been picked to host this year's KIJHL All-Star Game. We'll have more on that tomorrow during Mountain FM newscasts and tomorrow night on the blog.

Here's a quick look back to how Trail looked on their last and very recent northern swing...

DeKeyser to Western Michigan

Congratulations are due to former Trail Smoke Eater Danny DeKeyser who has committed to Western Michigan in the NCAA. Last season's Smokies defenceman of the year has earned that elusive Div 1 scholarship that so many terrific junior players are after. It's also a perfect fit for Danny as the school is only two and a half hours away from his family home. It couldn't happen to a more deserving young man.

DeKeyser was one of at least 10 BCHL level defencemen in Trail's training camp last season. He came from being a relative unknown in these parts to earning a spot among the eight guys who broke out of camp on the back end. Danny and the other rookies in that group each took their turns sitting out some games early. It didn't appear that he was necessarily going to emerge from the pack.

After those first few weeks of the season DeKeyser never sat again. He especially emerged as a force when an injury put Brandon Clark out of the line-up. Clark had been the obvious leader of Trail's back end early in the season and was at the time likely the team's MVP. When Clark went down a lot of ice time opened up and DeKeyser stepped up to prove he was one of the top young players in the league. He finished the year with 8 goals and 17 assists, but the majority of those points were scored as his game evolved in the second half of the year.

Danny was a pleasure to watch last season and everyone who watched him play knew it was only a matter of time before the scholarship offers came his way. DeKeyser chose to play closer to home this season in the USHL where he has 4 points in 7 games. However, I'd say his year in Trail was what woke up the hockey world to how much potential the Michigan native has. As Danny's game continues to grow this season in the USHL and he continues to mature physically, I believe he'll be a player to watch in the NCAA.

That whole back end from last season has made tremendous strides. DeKeyser is the first of the 08 rookies to line-up a scholarship, but it won't be long before guys like Koshey, Strukoff, Zmurchyk, Reardon and Smutek get those calls coming in. I also certainly expect Patrick Raley (who while technically not a rookie was like a whole new player last season compared to when we first saw him) to find his way to college opportunities. They were all part of a very exciting run to 11th spot in the national rankings last fall. It's just to bad that some key injuries pulled the rug out from under that team.

Congratulations to Danny and his family. All their hard work and dedication over the years has paid off. An opportunity like this means that no matter what happens in hockey, Danny is setting himself up for life. That's what this is all about.

Smokies drop both weekend games

Vernon, BC – Travis St. Denis' first career hat trick was the highlight of back to back losses for the Trail Smoke Eaters (6-18-1-1) in Vernon (24-1-0-0). The Vipers beat Trail 8-4 and 7-1 on Friday and Saturday nights.

Sam Mellor and Paul Mailey scored Trail's other goals. Darnell Dyck had 2 assists.

Montrose native Connor Jones responded with a hat trick of his own on Saturday. The Jones twins combined for 11 points while Vernon out shot the Smokies 91-51 over the weekend.

The Vipers have won all four games between the two teams this season. The defending national champions have only lost once so far this season.

Trail's next action is in Prince George on Thursday. After this week's northern trip the Smoke Eaters will then play 13 of their next 15 games at home.

ON THE TRAIL: Trail was only the second team this season to score at least 4 goals against Vernon in a game ... Travis St. Denis' hat trick was the second by a Smoke Eater so far this season. Nick Sandor scored one against Surrey in October ... Kiefer Smiley faced 72 shots in two starts over the weekend. Garrett Beckwith stopped 17 of 19 Vernon shots in relief of Smiley on Saturday ... Mike Betz suffered a lower body injury in his debut with Trail on Friday. Steve Koshey was injured in Saturday's game. The status of both players is questionable heading into this week's games ... Matt Wilkins will not return for the northern trip but will likely be back with the Smokies for their next home games ... Graeme Strukoff was suspended for Saturday's game after being involved in the second fight after a whistle. Strukoff squared off with Vipers Captain Kevin Kraus after Kraus was the third man into an altercation between Ben Matthews and Braden Pimm.

Betz and Ingram Interviews

Smokies Forward Mike Betz

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Smokies Coach Jim Ingram

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Betz to Trail

The Trail Smoke Eaters have added 1992 born forward Mike Betz to their line-up. Betz played parts of this and last season with the Spokane Chiefs of the WHL. Last year in 30 games as a 16 year old he had 2 points and was a +3 player. The Chiefs then sent him down to Sicamous in the KIJHL where he made a huge impression with 17 points in 13 games. This is a player that has a very imrpessive skill set. So much so that he was Spokane's 1rst round draft pick in the 2007 WHL Bantam draft. Betz went 12th overall. He'll join the Smokies with an eye to getting more playing time and developing his game as the Chiefs still believe he will become a full time fixture on their roster in seasons to come. It certainly doesn't hurt for Trail to develop a relationship with Spokane for similar situations in the future. In the meantime though he will bring his bag of tricks to Trail's line-up which includes some terrific puck skills, an excellent reach and a very good shot. He gives the Smokies another valuable right handed shot (EDIT: while the WHL website lists him as a right handed shot pictures I've since found show him shooting left so my apologies for the mistake), and with a 6'2, 215 pound frame he might be ideal to stick in front of the net on the power play. Betz is in practice this week and will likely make his Smokies debut this weekend on the road in Vernon on Friday and Saturday nights. As always yuo can hear those games on Mountain FM with Nelson Ford Trail Smoke Eaters play by play at 104.1 FM in Trail.

Unfortunately this addition also meant that someone had to go. Trail released defencemen David Piccard and Marc-Antoine Chaput to make room for Betz and to clear space heading into the December 1rst cut down date. By then the number of players on your roster and cards you have left to use can't exceed 25. Now the Smokies will have 22 players on the roster with 3 cards left to use. Depending on whether they make any moves before December 1rst that could leave them in a pretty strong position to make some moves before the January trade deadline. Of course there is always a lot of activity heading into that December 1rst cut down day so you never know what could come before then.

I do want to say a quick word about each player. I think both Piccard and Chaput absolutely have the ability to be impact players in Junior A. Piccard thinks the game well and rarely makes one of those big mistakes out there. He's solid, smart and effective. David wasn't going to make a huge offensive contribution at this level, but given time to continue developing he really is a guy you could count on in your own end. He showed what he could do in helping Nelson to a KIJHL championship last season and again really upped his game over the last month here in Trail. He is also a very classy and respectful young man who I'm sure will find success at whatever it is he chooses to do now.

Chaput took a couple of weeks to adjust to the move to Trail after coming all the way out from Quebec to play for Surrey. He has very good puck skills and the instinct of an offensive defenceman. That showed in his ability to make a transition to playing forward when called upon. In fact he even put up 3 points in a single game when he was playing up front against Quesnel. He's not a big player but he's willing to battle hard in the corners. He also thinks the game well and works hard. I suspect this is absolutely not the last we've seen of him at this level whether it's here or somewhere else in Canada.

Both players can make a contribution to this or another Junior A club. Unfortunately it was a numbers game. After the addition of Tommy Rizzardo (who had been injured in training camp) and Mitch Kaufmann the Smokies had 9 defencemen. That was never going to last. Injures to Graeme Strukoff and Justin Brown delayed the decision and gave some guys a chance to show what they could do. I'm sad to see both Piccard and Chaput go, but it's not a reflection of their inability to get the job done in my view as much as it is just the reality of having so many inexperienced guys on one team. They could have easily fit with anyone as a 5th or 6th guy this year but Trail had too many of those guys as rookies and needed to make a couple of moves to change that.

I wish them both well and am looking forward to seeing Betz in action. Every scouting report I've heard so far has been extremely positive. The first step for him in the orange and black again will likely be on Friday night in Vernon against the defending national champions. Talking about walking right into the fire! Should be a heck of an introduction to the BCHL for him.

If Betz turns out to be a forward with say "top 6" skills the Smokies are putting themselves in an excellent position when it comes to forward depth. With the emergence of Darnell Dyck, the return of Justin Brown from injury and the forthcoming return of Matt Wilkins from his injury the forward depth is looking very good. We could easily see 3 very good scoring lines here in Trail as things shape up over the next couple of weeks.

I'll have an interview with Smokies Coach Jim Ingram about the move tomorrow night on Mountain FM's Overtime between 6pm and 10pom again at 104.1 FM in Trail or on our website. The interview will be on the blog later on. I'll also try to track down the coaches in Spokane to get their view on Betz and what we can expect from him here in Trail.

NOTES

...The Smoke Eaters also moved the rights of F Adam Gummer (89) to Spruce Grove of the AJHL for the rights of D Ryan Stanton (89). Stanton is in his fourth year with the WHL's Moose Jaw Warriors. He's got 18 points in 18 games and is very likely going to finish his junior career in the WHL. This is just a matter of making a deal that will allow Gummer to continue his hockey career after not reporting to Trail's camp in August. This should make it clear to those who were calling for his rights to be used to acquire a 20 year old veteran defenceman that no such deal was even close to being out there. Hopefully Gummer gets his game back with Spruce Grove. He was Drayton Valley's leading scorer at the time that Trail picked him up for Skyler Smutek last year.

...Ryan Pinder's Vees blog reported today that Penticton made a move sending F Adam Zamec (89) to the Welington Dukes of the CCHL for future considerations. That leaves the Vees with one extra 20 year old slot for any additions between now and the January trade deadline.

On Pace

(Josh McEwan racks up the penalty minutes)

Math for me is a bit of a dangerous thing, but I decided to try it out anyway this afternoon. Using my trusty calculator I did a little bit of work to figure out what the stats would look like for Trail's skaters if they continued scoring at the pace they are at right now. I calculated this as if each player were going to play every game from now until the end of the season. Obviously that won't happen. Also I adjusted Matt Wilkins' stats as if he were going to start playing again not this weekend but next. Here's what I came up with:

• Tye Lewis: 30-33-63 (60 GP)
• Nick Sandor: 30-30-60 (60 GP)
• Scott Jacklin: 15-45-60 (60 GP)
• Sam Mellor: 25-28-53 (60 GP)
• Travis St. Denis: 26-26-52 (59 GP)
• Matt Wilkins: 4-41-45 (45 GP)
• Darnell Dyck: 21-20-41 (59 GP)
• Steve Koshey: 8-31-39 (59 GP)
• Wade Bennett: 0-29-29 (55 GP)
• Tommy Rizzardo: 4-24-28 (48 GP)
• Ben Matthews: 6-20-26 (55 GP)
• Paul Mailey: 8-16-24 (60 GP)
• Marc-Antoine Chaput: 7-14-21 (51 GP)
• Mitch Kaufmann: 8-11-19 (49 GP)
• Thomas Abenante: 6-9-15 (54 GP)
• Justin Brown: 3-10-13 (52 GP)
• Graeme Strukoff: 3-10-13 (52 GP)
• Eric Walker: 3-8-11 (59 GP)
• Sean Nugent: 5-5-10 (60 GP)
• David Piccard: 0-6-6 (54 GP)
• Josh McEwan: 0-4-4 (49 GP)

Of note, Josh would also rack up an astonishing 234 penalty minutes in 49 games if he keeps his current pace up. I guess you could say he loves to scrap.