By: Collin Schuck – IceRays Staff
Dec. 20, 2016
The holidays are here, and that means the college students have gone home for the next couple weeks while teams ramp up the festivities. In the mean time, the professional and junior players still are in action, even if for one more weekend, so the seventh edition of the IceRays Alumni Report, Vol. III looks at just that grouping of players hoping to get a little more cheer before the holidays arrive.
The cheer wasn’t around last week for goaltender Pheonix Copley (’10-’11) while his Chicago Wolves dropped into a bit of a skid in the American Hockey League (AHL). The Wolves have lost three-straight games, and Copley was part of two of those games beginning on Thursday against Grand Rapids. The North Pole, Alaska product lasted 36:30 minutes while conceding four goals on 14 shots in the eventual 7-1 home loss. The next game did get better on Saturday night against the reigning Calder Cup Champion Cleveland Monsters despite coming in a loss. Copley turned away 21 of 23 shots in the 2-1 overtime loss, and despite the mixed results he still has only allowed two goals or less in eight of 11 games this season. He also has a 5-4-2 record with a 2.25 goals-against average and a .917 save percentage with one shutout.
Is there a way that Chad Costello (’09-’10) will cool back down in the ECHL? As the temperatures have dropped, he has heated up to the tune of eight points over three games last week, helping the Allen Americans continue warming up. In those games, he put up three points with two goals on Tuesday against Colorado as well as four points on Saturday in Wichita. All of this leads him now to a nine-game point streak, racking up seven goals and 10 assists for 17 points in that span and improving on his league-leading point total to 42 on the year through 29 games. His lead atop the league is now three points ahead of Peter Sivak in Alaska.
After a hot start to the season in the United States Hockey League (USHL), forward Regen Cavanagh (’14-’16) cooled down mightily off his early pace during November. However, a recent stretch of games has him trending back toward starting form. The Chesapeake, Va., native has points in each of his last three games, including his fifth goal of the year on December 10 in Waterloo. That was his first goal since October 14, a span of 15 games and almost two months. Prior to that goal, Cavanagh had just two assists since the end of October, but his first three-game point streak of the season could kick-start him forward. He has five goals and eight assists for 13 points through 23 games.
Wins haven’t been as plentiful for goaltender Dryden McKay (’15-’16) since mid-November, but he’s remained consistent despite the results. The Downer’s Grove, Ill., netminder had a hiccup last weekend in the form of a four-goal night on Friday and the loss, but prior to this he hadn’t conceded more than three goals in each of his prior four games dating back to November 25 while his Madison Capitols have dropped four of five of his games since including one in a shootout. McKay’s junior career numbers continue to look promising for his future career, owning a 7-5-1 record with a 2.53 goals-against average and a .922 save percentage through 15 games.
Read the IceRays Alumni Report every Tuesday on www.goicerays.com, and hear the audio version on the IceRays Broadcast Network.
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Collin Schuck is the Director of Broadcasting & Media Relations for the Corpus Christi IceRays. He can be contacted at cschuck@goicerays.com or on Twitter at @CollinDSchuck.
