They are fit to be tied.
The Sherwood Park J. Ennis Midget AAA Kings have done an inordinate amount of sister kissing to start the season recording six ties in their first eight games.
Kings head coach Leo Reagan, who moved up from an assistant coaching position when longtime coach Sean Beissel was let go at the end of last season, said his team is already on a record-setting pace when it comes to recording unsatisfying conclusions to games.
“It’s been a bit of a different start,” he chuckled.
“We might break our old record for ties here before the second segment, the way it has been going. We had 12 ties a couple of years ago and we are halfway there already.”
Reagan said that while the team hasn’t been wracking up the wins, the ton of ties proves that his young squad is right with the pack on a competitive level.
“We’ve been in all of our games, which is obviously a real positive,” he said. “We have a really young team, so it is going to take a little while to get used to the league and the competition at this level. I can’t really gauge the league yet either. I don’t know if it is a strong league or just balanced. I know the North is as tight as I have seen in my four years where from top to bottom is only about four points difference. It is going to be a scramble all the way through to see who qualifies for the playoffs.”
Remarkably, the Kings’ 1-1-6 record has them sitting in a tie for second place in the Alberta Midget Hockey League’s 10-team Dodge North Division.
“It’s positive right now,” Reagan said. “Your first eight games, you kind of use those as a measuring stick to see where you are at. We have been in every game and have had leads in most of them. Being young, hopefully in the next 20 games we find a way to close those games out or score one more and put the game out of reach.”
Reagan said it appears his team is relatively well-stacked with talent from top to bottom for this campaign.
“I think we are pretty deep,” he said. “We have been able to play our full lineup so far and getting fairly good results, all told. We only have four returning players from last year and a balance of 16-year-olds and some representation from Camrose. We are a quick team and play a pressure game, using our speed to our advantage. Being young, we just have to learn to do that for 60 minutes. You can’t take 10 minutes off because then you find yourself in your D-zone the entire time. So far as a staff, we are very pleased with what we have.”
Parker Kelly leads the team with 11 points in eight games, followed by Tyler Brown with nine points. Talented offensive defenceman Dylan Plouffe is third in team scoring with eight points.
“Parker is from Camrose and has come out with a pretty good start and Tyler has been good as well as a returning player,” Reagan said. “Our defence corps has been fairly strong. We have been balanced the whole way through and have been able to play our whole lineup, which is what you want so you aren’t burning guys out by the end of the season. We have been happy with what we have in the lineup, one through 20.”
The Kings are on the road for a pair of games this weekend, playing the Knights of Columbus Pats (2-5-0) on Saturday night at the Bill Hunter Arena and then facing the Rangers (2-2-3) in Fort Saskatchewan on Sunday night.
Their next home games at the Sherwood Park Arena are on Nov. 1 and 2 when they welcome the Calgary Royals and then the Calgary Northstars to town.
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