An 11-3 thrashing of the Shuswap Outlaws gave the Penticton Heat U11 teams its first win in three years.
“This is pretty neat for them,” said Heat coach Chris Danby.
The players started doing things on the field Danby had them work on in practice, including moving the ball, that led to the convincing result.
“The kids were passing a lot,” said Danby, who received praise from the Heat’s older age group coaches on their play. “Defensively we didn’t give them a lot of opportunities.”
Danby used brothers Connor and Liam Danby, Ben Coombes, Griffin Semple and Keegan McGifford in various situations and the players made solid contributions to limit the Outlaws’ chances. Chay Gettens and Liam led the Heat offence with hat-tricks, while Cylis Charlton and Semple scored twice and Orion Jack scored once.
U15 Heat remain unbeatable
Penticton picked up a 6-4 win over Kamloops and demolished the Outlaws 23-6 to improve to 4-0. In the first game, Ben Olsen scored two goals, Beau Chetner a goal and an assist and a goal each by Kale Lawrence, Colin Duffield and Brendan Craig. In the offensive explosion against Shuswap, Chetner scored five while collecting four assists. Matt Carson had four goals, while Olsen had three plus an assist, Craig and Duffield netted hat-tricks, Nash Moog scored twice. Kale Lawrence scored once and added an assist, while Logan Cote and Hayden Marschall each scored once.
Coach Dan Chetner said their defence showed improvement, but to reach their potential they need to improve immensely at both ends of the field.
“Some of what is required is practice time to address the technical issues of defence and offence, but we also need to address our intensity,” said Chetner.
U13 picks up another split
The Heat’s U13 team got pounded 13-1 by Kamloops, then bounced back to victory over Kelowna 15-7. Rhys MacDonald scored in the loss, then in the win. He and Keegan Allen netted four goals. Isaac Jack potted a hat-tirck, Cody Heydenfeldt had two goals along with one goal each for Jacob Stewart and Michael Preston.
Coach Dan MacDonald said his team played really well. The Heat rotated players as a goalie because they don’t have a designated player for that position.
“This creates challenges as not all players have prior goal experience and don’t have significant time to practice the position,” said MacDonald.
Practice this week focused on defence and positioning on the attack.
“They are starting to gel as a team, understand their positions and running plays,” said MacDonald.