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HELLYER LADDER

Team	GP	W	L	PTS
Ice	4	4	0	12
Thunder	6	4	2	12
Bears	4	3	1	9
Mustangs	2	1	1	3
Ice Dogs	5	1	4	3

RURAK LADDER

Team	GP	W	L	OTW	OTL	PTS
Northstars	4	3	0	1	0	11
Lightning	6	3	3	0	0	9
Adrenaline	3	1	1	0	1	4
Brave	6	1	5	0	0	3
Rhinos	4	0	4	0	0	0

SCORING LEADERS

Jeremiah
Addison (PER)

Player	Points
Aiden Wagner (NNS)	18
Wehebe Darge (NNS)	15
francis Drolet (NNS)	15
Zane Jones (PER)	13

GOALIE LEADERS

N Novysedlak (BRE)

1.000

Goalie	SV%
Rhys Pelliccione (PER)	.950
Tatsunoshin Ishida (MIC)	.933
Leo Bertein (PER)	.905
Charles Smart (NNS)	.903

CBR Brave claim points in physical win

Sunday, June 8, 2014 - Submitted by Conor Hickey

The CBR Brave defeated a physical Sydney Bears team 4-1 in Canberra on Saturday night.

The Brave have moved momentarily to second on the ladder after the win, but settled into third after Sunday’s matches.

Early on it looked as if the Brave were in for a rough game as the Bears muscled up.

The Bears’ physicality appeared to shock the Brave as they were unable to generate scoring opportunities.

The dominance by the Bears led to a Ben Di Marco goal late in the first period, and the Bears led 1-0 at the first intermission.

While the physicality from the Bears continued for the entire game, the dominance did not.

Both teams had multiple players sent off. The Bears sat seven to the Brave’s five penalties.

Bears player Brandon Stobbs was sent off twice in the final period, and was heavily involved in the game, nearly starting a number of fights.

Stobbs said he was trying to put the Brave off their game with his physical play.

“I have to be an energy player, take it to the guys and when you’re down you have to try and find other ways to get into the other team, and try and get our players going,” Stobbs said.

In the second period the momentum shifted to the Brave.
They equalised early with a goal by Anton Kokkonen, before Stephen Blunden scored at the midway mark. The Brave took a 2-1 lead to the final break.

The Brave did not let up and scored two more goals in the third period.

Blunden’s second goal of the night came in the final period, and saw him become the AIHL’s leading goal scorer, with 13 from nine games, along with 11 assists.

Brave defenseman James Byers scored his first AIHL goal in the final period, and he said he was pleased to finally score one after a number of fruitless seasons.

Brave coach Matti Luoma said he was happy with the win and impressed his team wasn’t overly distracted by the Bears’ physical play.

“The refereeing was fair. He calls anything that is done after the whistle. We were quite disciplined. Not the best, but yeah, I am happy we didn’t go pushing and shoving after the whistle. We did it a little bit but not too much,” Luoma said.

Bears coach Vladimir Rubes was magnanimous in defeat.

“You know what, really, it’s good to see the Brave are doing well because I know we’ve been down where they’ve been for a few years in a row, and it’s hard to be there and regroup and rebuild,” Rubes said.

Rubes said penalties really hurt the Bears and they couldn’t afford to give the Brave opportunities to score by being one man down on the ice.

“Our plan was to come out hard, we figured the Brave might have been a little bit over confident after the big win last week against Melbourne, but what can I say? The Brave are tough. They’ve got some good players and we did the best we could,” Rubes said.

Despite the loss, Rubes said the Bears still had a good chance of making the finals and said he hoped the return of four key players, who were injured or playing in the Inline series, could spark a winning streak for the Bears.

Brave chairman Peter Chamberlain said the team had extra motivation due to a terminal illness to Brave player David Lewis’ father.

“Ian Lewis has been a long time hockey supporter, and has had long time involvement with hockey in the ACT,” Chamberlain said.

“Tonight was about showing support for Dave Lewis and his family, and playing the game for him and his father.”

There was a moment of silence at the beginning of the game in honour of Jacob “Snowy” Moreland, who died four years ago on military service in Afghanistan.

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