Sunday, November 6, 2011

SJHL POWER RANKINGS

Press Release

1-Battlefords North Stars
The Stars are red hot and new head coach Kevin Hasselberg deserves a ton of credit for overhauling the defense and getting stellar netminding from Hildebrand and Creech.

2-Estevan Bruins
Contenders before their time. Go figure. In the past, everyone figured the Bruins would contend and they didn't. This year, nobody gave them a chance and look where they are.

3-Flin Flon Bombers
Estevan North? The Bombers are laced with youngsters, but you wouldn't know it looking at their record. There will be growing pains, as evidenced by a lacklustre four game home stand a couple of weeks ago.

4-Nipawin Hawks
The wins were, maybe, a little too easy off the start. They've come back to earth a little bit, especially since a dismal Showcase weekend.

5-Weyburn Red Wings
Dwight McMillan for Coach Of The Year? Everybody seems to be pulling their weight right now and the secondary scoring hasn't been an issue.

6-Humboldt Broncos
Better goaltending is starting to come as evidenced by Hrynkiw's game Wednesday night against Melville. Andrew Johnston is red hot.

7-La Ronge Ice Wolves
Defense and goaltending win championships and the Ice Wolves have lots of that at the moment. Some nights they couldn't put the puck in the ocean, but they are doing enough to win more than they lose.

8-Melville Millionaires
Sensing chemistry may not be right on this team. They are in a lot of close games, but they've also lost a lot of close games. Wakaluk has stabilized the goaltending, but mental errors are key times have cost them.

9-Yorkton Terriers
A little banged up and a little small on the back end maybe caused them to have a tough October. They don't really seem to have that superstar that most of the other top teams have.

10-Notre Dame Hounds
Starting to struggle a bit. Reichenbach stole a few earlier in the year, but that's not happening at the moment.

11-Kindersley Klippers
Ravaged by injuries and a slow ten games to start the year, the Klippers have endured some unexpected growing pains.

12-Melfort Mustangs
Unlike the Klippers, Melfort's growing pains were very much expected.

(Nathan can be reached at fourniern@students.nescom.edu)

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