Chadders U16 and New Zealand U18 National Team Play Two Exhibition Games
The Chadders U16 team squared off with the New Zealand National Team for two exhibition games this past week. The games were played as preparation games for New Zealand, as they head to the World Championships in Mexico City.
The first game was played Monday night at West Valley Accord in front of a solid home town crowd. Chadders jumped out to an early lead and never looked back. Henri Laurilla started out the scoring on the first shift of the game. Chase McDonald added two goals, and Dom Lancaster added another to round out the first period scoring for Chadders . New Zealand came out in the second and scored right away to cut the lead to 4 1. However, Chadders was not about to let this game slip away. The second period was all about scoring for the defensemen. Zack Taylor and Tory Cigana both had second period goals, and after two periods Chadders had mounted a 6 1 lead. The third period was much of the same as Chadders added two more goals. Doug Newell scored early in the third on a pretty little move in front, and Tory Cigana added his second goal on the night as he beat the New Zealand goaltender with a laser wrist shot high glove. Cooper OBryan and Laurilla led the passing attack with two assists each, while Cigana, Johansson, Berard, Crandall, Ziegler, McDonald, and Howard each had one. Chadders goaltender Daniel Nelson also played a solid game stopping 23 of 24 shots.
Game two on Wednesday was a hard fought game, played at the Olympic Oval in Kearns, UT. Again on this night Chadders jumped out to an early lead on a goal from Ian Crandall. Later in the first JJ Ziegler added a goal to make it a 2 0 game. New Zealand added a goal late in the first to cut Chadders lead in half, and the score was 2 -1 in favor of Chadders after one period. The second period was an up and down battle with great goaltending from both teams. Chadders goalie Hayden Capouzzo played a good second period in order to preserve the one goal lead. In the third period Chadders forward Tom Johansson added two nice one timer goals. New Zealand tied its best to mount a comeback, but fell short. Chadders defenseman Ian Anderson added a late third period power play goal, and that sealed the game as a 5 2 victory for Chadders. Again in this game Henri Laurilla led the passing attack with two assists, while Brown, Ziegler, Newell, OBryan, and McDoanld each had one.
The games turned out to be great preparation for both teams. New Zealand is taking this momentum down to Mexico City, and Chadders is going to take this success and help build towards Southern California and ultimately Regionals.
-Adam Kostichka