vs.  
GAME LINK

The puck drops and the season officially begins for the St. Louis Scarecrows and the Colorado Raptors. Both teams hungrily look to capture their first victory.

First Period:

As soon as the game starts the Colorado Raptors win the faceoff and Alex Winters leaps on the puck, sending the puck into the back of the net in one swift motion. 1-0 Raptors. This wasn't the start the Crows were looking for. Sure enough, less than 10 minutes later into the period Konstantin Voloshin tapped an unfortunate rebound in the net by Cain, followed by two more goals in a five minute window soon afterward. Sloppy all around for the Crows. 4-0 Raptors.

Second Period:

The second period was another affair entirely for the St. Louis Scarecrows as they had just been embarrassed with the 4 goals scored on them prior. After a bit of back and forth action the Crows finally managed to get on the scoreboard with a goal from Jerry Larry, with assists from Brock Nuck and Slip McScruff. Despite the previous period being filled with goals, that would be all for the scoring in this 20 minutes of action.

Third Period:

Nicky Pederson opened up the scoring in the third, 2 minutes and 25 seconds in, and not 30 seconds later another goal for the Crows was put up by Bernard Freeman. Suddenly it was a 3-4 game and the tying goal was in grasp. These hopes start to die out as action evened out between both teams as the period went on. The head games and chirping started to work against the Crows now as Samuel Jalopski felt the need to take a four minute double minor for roughing with 12 minutes left in the period. Philip Winter sealed the deal and capped the win off for the Raptors after scoring a goal on the power play, assisted by Tony Pepperoni and Alex Winters. Tough night for the Scarecrows.

Final Score and Summary:

5 - 3

What could have been a complete blowout for the St. Louis Scarecrows turned into a competitive game. This wasn't what their management was looking for, no doubt, but there likely won't be any changes heading into the next game. As the Colorado Raptors they got exactly what they wanted. A win against a tough team. You can never take those for granted in the SMJHL.


Three Stars:

3rd Star: Vladimir Vaskov

An offensive minded right winger from Vladivostok, Russia, Vladimir Vaskov left quite an impression on the Scarecrows in this game with one goal and one assist, 2 hits, and 6 shots. This performance definitely merited the third star of the game.

2nd Star: Alex Winters

Alex Winters had a similar night to Vaskov with one goal and one assist. He also had 6 shots, terrorizing the Crows netminders. He also managed to lay the body three times as well. An easy 2nd star performance.

1st Star: Konstantin Voloshin

Voloshin is primarily a sniper and sniping is what he did against the Crows. Two goals is impressive enough but he also had an assist to go with it. He carries a healthy +2 out of this game and adds 4 shots and 2 hits to his career totals. Not bad at all.

Code:

551 words

sigs by ToeDragon84

Game 3: STL-COL
While rookie center Konstantin Voloshin was dominated in the faceoff circle (he won 36 percent of his faceoffs), he impacted every other phase of the game on his way to first star honors in his first SMJHL game. The Ukrainian forward had two goals, an assist, a +2 rating, four shots on goal, two hits, all in less than 18 minutes of ice time. It was his first multi-point game of his SMJHL career, all the more impressive that he recorded all three points in the first period.

Let me reiterate: the fourth overall pick in this year’s SMJHL Entry Draft, in his first game, scored or assisted on three straight goals in a 2:38 span midway through the first period. This flurry of activity, where veteran winger Vladimir Vaskov also scored a powerplay goal and earned an assist on Voloshin’s second goal, saw the St. Louis Scarecrows facing a manageable 1-0 hole turn into an insurmountable 4-0 deficit going into the first intermission.

Veteran St. Louis goaltender Aleister Cain hoped this season would see him record better numbers than he was able to last season. Instead he was run from the crease in his first start after letting up four goals in just nine shots on net.


[211 words]

M'Baku Olubori || #81 || RW

Drafted 4th overall in S64 SMJHL Draft by Regina

Drafted 95th overall in S65 SHL Draft by Baltimore

Won S68 Ryan Jesster Trophy (Rookie of the Year)

Cassius Darrow || #81 || RD
-------------------------------------------
SMJHL Stats:
S44 - S46 || COL  || GP: 150 || G: 15 || A: 85 || P: 100 || +/-: +1 || SB: 195
S47 - S55 || BUF  || GP: X || G: X || A: X || P: X || +/-: X || SB: X
S56 - S63 || SEA  || GP: 0 || G: 0 || A: 0 || P: 0 || +/-: 0 || SB: 0
-------------------------------------------
Drafted 8th overall in S44 SMJHL Draft to Colorado
Co-Winner of S44 Zach Miller Trophy
Drafted 4th overall in S45 SHL Draft to Buffalo
Named S45 & S46 Captain of the Colorado Raptors
3-time Challenge Cup Champion (S46, S48, S55)
Named Assistant Captain of Buffalo Stampede S53-S55
Drafted 1st overall S56 Expansion Draft by Seattle
Named Captain of the Seattle Argonauts in S56
Bojo Biscuit Winner S57, S58

Baltimore Platoon GM || S64 - present

SHL Executioner || S62 - S65
SHL Awards Committee || S57 - S66
SHL Historian Committee || S53 - S64
SHL Head Office || S60 - S61
SMJHL Awards Head || S48 - S57
Colorado Raptors GM || S48 - S53
Colorado Raptors Co-GM || S47
Team Germany Federation Head || S44 - S46
SMJHL HO Member - S45-S46
SMJHL Head Office Intern - S44 

---

Thank you karey, OrbitingDeath Ragnar, and sköldpaddor for sigs! 

Physical Game Stats
Hits:
16
32

Takeaways: (x is hit by y and loses puck)
9
17

Let's talk about who had the better physical game here tonight.  The Raptors had more takeaways than the Scarecrows had hits, simple as that.  8 players on the Raptors had a perfect record for hits while only 4 of the Crows could say the same thing.  The Crows (56.25%) edge out the Raptors (53.125%) in terms of Takeaway % but that doesn't matter when you are being out hit 2:1.

Gvidas Kazlauskas and Phillip Winter on the Raptors were both tied for most hits at 4 apiece, however they weren't terribly effective as Winter had the only takeaway out of those 8 hits.

Rookie Slip McScruff on the Crows had the best personal night for hits, in a four-way tie for second most hits at 3 but registering the most takeaways in the game with a perfect record.

credit to Flappy, ToeDragon, and Carpy

Our ESPN player of the game is Konstantin Voloshin!

Konstantin Voloshin had a monster performance. Voloshin scored two goals which ended up being the game tying and game winning goals. Voloshin had an assist and finished with three points. Voloshin did take a penalty, but only a minor. Voloshin had a big .4 shots and layed two hits. Only blemish for Voloshin was a poor performance in the faceoff circle. Voloshin has shown the raptors are for real this year and should be a scary team in the playoffs. Konstantin Voloshin, Gvidas Kazlauskas and Vladimir Vaskov make a very dangerous and a very difficult to pronounce line.

 Updates  

Comment One:

Timo Haas' Goalie of the Game

Surprisingly the goaltender of the game in this matchup will not be coming from the winning squad. Willis Vincent, backup goaltender for the St. Louis Scarecrows, came into a game already out of hand and did his very best to keep the Scarecrows within striking distance. While it did not work and the Crows ended up falling to the Raptors 5-3, none of that is on the shoulders of Vincent. Facing 25 shots over more than two periods and only surrendering one goal, after Aleister Cain gave up a whopping four goals on 9 shots, you can really see that the hopes of St Louis winning would be higher with Vincent starting this game. There are many reasons the Crows fell to the Raptors on this night but not a single finger should be pointed at our Goalie of the Game, Willis Vincent. His agile play and mad reflexes when faced with a peppering of shots is why he is - Timo Haas' Goalie of the Game.

[166 Words]

Comment Two:

Unsung Hero(es) brought to you by Virgin Mobile

Tonight's unsung hero award goes to Gvidas Kazlauskas of the Colorado Raptors. While he did not put a single point into the tallies, the hard work of Kazlauskas contributed to the win for the Colorado club and shows up on the scorer's sheet in different ways. Laying 4 hits, tied for the most on the night from either squad, as well as putting the puck on the net 3 times AND having a +2 rating in the game, has shown why the hard work of Gvidas Kazlauskas is extremely important to the upstart Raptors club. His ability to generate scoring chances his teammates, dig pucks out of the corners, and play solid defensive hockey is a major factor for why the Raptors took care of the Crows tonight.

[128 Words]

Comment Three:

Carl's Jr. Star of the Game

With two goals and an assists, our Carl's Jr. Star of the Game goes to Konstantin Voloshin. Capitalizing on the struggling Aleister Cain, Voloshin put in all of his points in the first period. In a three minute span the Raptors and Voloshin scored three goals to go up 4-0 on the Crows. Silky mitts and a hard shot allowed Voloshin to put home his first and second goal of the night AND the season in a short span. What a game from the Ukrainian Rookie. Sometimes it is difficult for a young player to make an impact so quickly but in only his first game in the SMJHL, Voloshin has scored three points. We look forward to a bright season from the young sniper.

[125 Words]

Eryk Siniskaya || Defense || Unsigned ||


Timo Haas || Goalie || Los Angeles Panthers || Retired/Hall of Fame