Magicians and Cougars stay perfect in USPHL Midwest

Both the Chicago Cougars and St. Croix Valley Magicians boosted their season opening records to 3-0 with wins Friday (Sept. 18) in United States Premier Hockey League – Midwest play.

The Cougars who still have yet to play on home ice, boosted its record to 3-0 with a 5-1 against the Dells Ducks in a battle of 2-0 squads.

The Magicians also boosted its record to 3-0 with a 5-4 win on home ice against the Steele Country Blades.

Both the Wisconsin Rapids Riverkings and Kalkaska Rhinos made winning debuts as well, the Riverkings capturing a 4-1 win on home ice against teh Marquette Royales while the Rhinos downed the Alpena Flyers 4-1.

In other games, the Michigan Wild picked up its first win with a 2-1 on the road against the Motor City Hawks and the host Forest Lake Lakers shutout the visiting Blaine Energy 8-0.

Cougars 5  at Ducks 1 

The Cougars scored the lone first period goal at the Poppy Waterman Ice Arena Friday and added two more in the second before the host Ducks got on the board.

The score remained at 3-1 after two, but the Cougars piled on another pair in the final 20 minutes for insurance.

Nik Kropp, 17, from Northbrook, IL and Andrew Van Dyke, 18, from Elmhurst, IL both picked up a goal and two assists in the game for the Cougars and other goals came from: Hunter Schiffman, 18, from Rockford, IL; Matthew Letmanski, 17, from Wheaton, IL and Tom Stanislavski, 20, from Palos Hills, IL.

David Kaplan, 18, from Chicago, scored the lone Ducks goal.

Jessie Heisz, 18, from Janesville, WI stopped 31 shots to pick up the win in goal for the Cougars while Stefan Demetz, 20, from Ortisei, Italy and Tyler Arneson, 19, from Reedsburg, WI both took a turn in the Ducks’ goal, combining to handle 32 of 37 Cougar shots.

Blades 4 at Magicians 5 (ot)

Peter Karavos, 19, from Rolling Meadows, IL, scored late to force the overtime segment and then buried the game winner as well 67 seconds into the extra period, allowing the Magicians to boost its regular season record to 3-0.

The Blades never trailed until the overtime game winner, carrying a 2-1 lead out of the first and 3-2 heading to the final frame.

Karavos also added two assists to wrap up a four-point game and Yannick Zehnder, 17, from Switzerland also picked up a couple of assists in the game. Other Magician goals came from Jared Mickelson, 18, from Inner Grove Heights, MN; Cole Buhl, 17, from South St. Paul, MN and Lane Eliason, 19, from Superior, WI.

Chase Lewis, 18,  from North Carolina and Wilson Anderle, 19, from Hanover, MN both  scored once and set up two for the Blades with Jesse Guyer, 17, from Utah adding a goal and assist. Drew Gustavson, 18, from Winona, MN scored the other Blades goal.

Jason Footlick, 17, from California stopped 24 of 28 shots to secure the overtime win for the Magicians while Wyatt Ulrich, 19, from International Falls, MN handled 37 of 42 in goal for the Blades.

Royales 1 at Riverkings 4

The Riverkings opened the regular season with a home win, grabbing a 1-0 lead in the opening period at the South Wood Recreation Center and pilin on another three in the middle frame before the now 0-3 Royales managed to pull one back, shattering the shutout bid of Link Ferch, a 19-year-old from Texas just 6:47 from the final buzzer.

Tyler Albitz, 18, from Cleveland, OH scored twice for the Riverkings with others added by Kevin Van Bokkelen, 18, from Hudson, OH and Chris Estey, 18, from Chicago. Austyn Renn countered with the lone Royales goal.

Ferch turned aside eight shots to pick up the win and Kyle Mugica, 20, from California, stopped 57 of 61 in goal for the Royales.

Flyers 1 at Rhinos 4 

The Rhinos won its opener, breaking it open in the second period with three goals, turning a 1-1 draw after one into a 4-1 cushion heading to a scoreless third period.

Robert Cerepak, 20, from New Jersey and Matt Culot, 19, from Massachusetts both picked up a goal and assist in the game for the Rhinos, Cameron Lanier, 19, from Massachusetts and Darren Aikens, 20, from Florida added the other Rhinos goals.

The Flyers team was also playing its first game of the season, Aaron Nowak, 16, from Alpena scoring the only goal for his team.

Austin Hannaford, 19, from Alberta made 19 saves to grab the win in goal for the Rhinos and at the other end, Hunter Myers, 20,. from Farmington Hills, MI made 48 saves.

Energy 0 at Lakers 8

After opening a narrow 1-0 lead in the opening period, the Lakers all but put this one away with a four goal second period and added three more unanswered markers in the third.

Zachary Remers, 19, from Florida,  paced the offense, netting a hat trick and adding two assists for the Lakers and Brian Miller, 19, from New Jersey added two goals and three helpers.

Dan Peterson, 18, from Mora, MN; Caleb Santa Maria, 18, from Georgia and Griffin Waters, 19, from Minneapolis, counted the other Lakers goals while Aleks Zakirov, 18, from Russia made 11 saves to earn the shutout.

In the Energy goal, Blair Sanders, 20, from Kansas City, MO and Drew Pehrson, 18, from Lino Lakes, MN both took a turn, combining to stop 42 of 50 Laker shots.

Wild 2 at Hawks 1

All of the scoring in this one came in the first period at McCann Arena.

Zach Elkins, 17, from Dearborn, MI and Colton James, 19, from Clarkston, MI scored to put the Wild up 2-0 before Andrew Baxter, 18, from Clinton Twp, MI scored the lone Hawks goals.

Kory Dombrowski, 20, from Florida, made 56 saves to earn the win in goal for the Wild and Jacob Gorzelski stopped 27 of 29 in goal for the Hawks.

Four of these games — Marquette at Wisconsin Rapids, Chicago at Dells, Michigan Wild at Motor City and Alpena at Kalkaska were set to get do-overs the following day while Blaine Energy travels to Steele County, Lakers move into St. Croix Valley and the Illiana Blackbirds will be at the Detrioit Fighting Irish home opener.