The Save-On-Foods Oceanside Generals snapped their 11-game losing streak last Friday night, beating the Comox Valley Glacier Kings 6-5.
Quinlan Moore scored his second goal in as many games for the Gens, with Troy MacTavish adding two, and Josh Harvey, Ethan Sundstrum and newcomer Tyler Graham rounding out the Gens’ scoring.
Matt Henwood, 16, got the start in net, making 37 saves for his first win in the Vancouver Island Junior Hockey League.
“It felt good to finally win one,” forward Landon Dziadyk said. “We’ve been working hard as a team, had a lot of close games that we should have won in that losing streak but it’s nice to finally get that monkey off our backs.”
Still trying to find the right combination of players, the Gens traded away 20-year-old captain Chandler Bruyckere to the Nanaimo Buccaneers in exchange for Tyler Graham, 19, from Sechelt. Graham made an immediate impact, scoring a goal and an assist.
“It’s tough when you lose your captain,” forward Tristan Sailor said. “We’re going to have to come together as a team, work hard and be the team that we know we can be. It just goes to show you that anyone can be traded at anytime, so we’ve got to not only work hard for each other but show we’ve got what it takes to play here and contribute to this hockey team as well.”
The Gens were without leading scorer Mathieu Jallabert, who was suspended two games for abuse of an official after the last game against the Campbell River Storm. He’ll be back for the second of three games this week.
Thursday night, they travel to Nanaimo to take on Bruyckere and his new team (7:15 p.m.). Friday night, the Gens are home to host the Kerry Park Islanders (7:30 p.m.) at Howie Meeker Arena at Oceanside Place. Saturday night, the Storm is back in Parksville (7:30 p.m.).
“We need to do the little things well,” forward Cam Nickerson said. “We’ve got to lay the body, put as many pucks on net as we can and do what we can to play mistake free hockey. Limiting our mistakes and taking advantage of when the other team makes mistakes will help us out getting some more wins. If we can do the little things well, good things will come our way.”
Teammate Tristan Sailor echoed Nickerson.
“We’ve gotta keep the momentum,” he said.
“We worked well last game but there’s room for improvement always.”
“At the end of the day, it’s the team that works the hardest for 60 minutes that usually comes out the winner and that’s what we learned against Comox last week.”