Jones first tally is Ducks’ game winner

By Jim den Hollander

Editor/Publisher

Saukhockey.info

Jackson Jones (‘04/Bloomer, Wis.) couldn’t have picked a better time to score his first goal for the Dells Ducks.

The defenseman’s shot from the blue line went off a Mullets player and gave the Ducks its first and only lead on the way to a 3-1 win for the visitors at Augsburg University Ice Arena Thursday night.

The goal was the middle tally of a three-goal second period for the Ducks, charging back from a 1-0 deficit and snapping a three-game losing streak.

The team started December coming off its best month of hockey in three seasons though and picked up right where the boys left off before Thanksgiving Break.

Ethan Matthews (‘02/Granger, IN) had the first Ducks’ goal tying the game in the fifth minute of the middle frame, from Mikel Ferran Cobo (‘02/Mexico City) and Adam Brown (‘02/Westmont, IL) setting the stage for Jones who got help from Logan Potts (‘03/Allen, TX) and Gabe Krueger (‘03/Blaine, MN).

Jones scored with 4:44 to play in the period and Kai Neumaier (‘03/St. Charles, IL) added an insurance tally a little over three minutes later from Brown and Braydan Kirchmann (‘04/Waterloo, IA).

The lone Mullies goal was scored by Ben Willcoxson (’03/Scottsdale, AZ) with 7:11 to play in the opening period.

From there it was up to the goaltenders as Chris Mazurek (‘03/Batavia, IL) collected his second win with 25 stops and Alex Falkenhagen (02/Thornhill, ON), one of the league’s busiest goaltenders stopped 35 shots for the Mullets.

The Ducks outshot their host in all three periods, including a 16-9 margin out of the gate and 15-8 through the three goal second frame.

After a busy November that saw three and four-game weekends before the norm, the Ducks enjoy a rare weekend off after this Thursday night contest that boosted the team’s record to 5-16-2-1 for 13 points, already four points more than they collected in 2021-22.

More importantly, they widened the gap between them in eighth place and the ninth place (4-15-0-1) to four points while creeping to within four of the seventh place Minnesota Blue Ox. Both teams have played fewer games (the Ox several fewer) but the Mullets will make up a couple this weekend with other games in Isanti against the Outlaws Saturday and Owatonna Sunday against the Steele County Blades

The Ducks can prepare a little more for a rematch with the Mullets back at Augsburg next Thursday night – the first of a three-game weekend and seven games in nine days carrying the Ducks to the Christmas Break.

Numbers – The three goals on Thursday run the team’s total to 57 on the season so far with 20 games to play. That’s just 37 shy of last season’s 94 goal total. At the other end, Ducks allowed 333 goals last season compared to 118 so far this season. The team is on pace to shave a large number off the total.

Individually, Matthew leads the team in points with 20 while Jack Kopfstein has the most goals with eight, one more than Matthews and Potts.

In goal, Jadon Mammen (‘04/Wheaton, IL) and Mazurek both have two wins and Mammen leads the way in Save with a .900 showing so far. Mazurek leads in minutes with 498 and shots against with 346.

Motown is mean town to Ducks Saturday

By Jim den Hollander

Editor/Publisher

Saukhockey.info

After a promising start Friday, the Dells Ducks ran into a couple tough opponents Saturday at the USPHL Premier Midwest-West Detroit Showcase.

Once again, goals were hard to come by for the Ducks who were shutout by the Motor City Gamblers Saturday afternoon and dropped a 5-2 decision against the Columbus Mavericks Saturday night, bringing the team to the halfway mark on its regular season.

Dells Ducks

Gamblers 5 Ducks 0

The Gamblers, formerly known as the Detroit Fighting Irish from the Midwest-East Division dominated the Ducks with a 37-17 edge in shots including a 16-5 margin in the first period.

Chris Mazurek (‘03/Batavia, IL) was beaten three times in that opening period but limited the Gamblers to just two more goals on 21 shots the rest of the way. One of the Gamblers’ goals came from Jayden Tkaczuk who played the previous two seasons with the Ducks and led the team in scoring in 2020-21.

Mavericks 5 Ducks 2

Saturday night, the Mavs opened the scoring with two goals 1:42 apart but Ducks’ defender Jack Kopfstein (‘05/Vista, CA) pulled one back later in the period with his eight of the season from Logan Potts (‘03/Allen, TX) and Mikel Ferran Cobo (‘04/Mexico City, Mexico).

The Mavericks, from the USPHL’s Great Lakes Division, added another a few minutes later to carry a 3-1 lead out of the opening period and that stood up until the final frame when two more had the Mavericks up 5-1 before Kai Neumaier (‘03/St. Charles, IL) pulled one more back late in the contest.

Anthony Falzone went to the blue paint for the second time on the weekend, facing 38 shots in the contest.

The Saturday losses dropped the team’s overall record to 4-15-2-1 at the 22-game mark, leaving 22 to play in the regular season.

The Ducks have one game left in Detroit, wrapping up the pre-Thanksgiving portion of its schedule today (Sunday, Nov. 20) against the Fort Wayne Spacemen from the Midwest-East Division.

Falzone stands tall in goal against Riverkings

By Jim den Hollander

Editor/Publisher

Saukhockey.info

The Dells Ducks made the short trek to Wisconsin Rapids last weekend (Feb. 17-18) dropping a pair of decisions in the penultimate weekend of the USPHL regular season, 5-2 on the first night before the Riverkings handed them a lopsided 11-0 defeat the following night.

Looking to snap a long losing streak and gather some momentum heading into the post season.

The Ducks made some big moves in the time between games with top scorers Caden Glamkowski and Jayden Tkaczuk both wearing new jerseys as of last weekend, giving both a shot at making some post season noise with the Chicago Cougars and Detroit Fighting Irish respectively.

As they have all season, the Ducks relied heavily on the goaltending this past weekend and Anthony Falzone (‘03/St. Charles, IL) played a big role in keeping the first game close. Falzone faced close to 70 shots while the Ducks triggered just 11 at the opposite end, but Falzone stood tall throughout the 60-minute contest.

In fact, Francesco Addante (‘02/Glenview, IL) picked up days before in the Glamkowski trade, fired the lone goal of the first period three minutes into the game from Kai Neumaier (‘03/St. Charles, IL). That allowed the Ducks to carry a 1-0 lead into the middle period despite a massive 28-3 edge on the shots board for the home side.

The Riverkings finally found a way past Falzone near the halfway mark of the second period and that opened the floodgates for three more, giving the Rapids’ crew a 4-2 edge heading to the third period.

Luca Maislin (‘03/Montreal, QC) fired his fifth goal in nine games since joining the Ducks while Bryce Jacobsen (‘02/DeForest, WI), Ducks’ captain and now, team leading scorer, collected his 19^th assist and 30^th point.

Riverkings’ fourth goal was scored by Jeffrey Rebman (‘01/Libertyville, IL) a fifth-year junior who played both the 2017-18 and 2018-19 seasons with the Ducks.

The Riverkings held an 18-5 edge in shots in the middle period and pounded the Ducks with a 22-3 edge in the third, resulting in one final goal.

On Saturday, the Riverkings dominated the shot clock again but this time they found the net early and often on its way to an 11-0 whitewash, the 10^th consecutive loss for the Ducks who enter this weekend with three final chances – two in Hudson Friday and Saturday and back on home ice Sunday – to break into the win column.

The Riverkings were up 4-0 after a period and added another five in the middle period before putting it away with a couple goals down the stretch.

Drew Mosely (’02/St. Louis, MO), Jadon Mammen (’04/Grapevine, TX) and Falzone each took a turn in goal in this one, combining to kick out 57 in the contest.

Sunday’s game will give local fans one final chance to get a look at the Ducks this season as they take on the Steele County Blades in a 6:30 p.m. start at the Lake Delton Ice Arena.

The playoff match ups have been determined, at least for the Ducks who face a tough assignment, going into battle next weekend against the Minnesota Blue Ox. Dates and times for that Best-of-Three series are still to be announced.

More tough lessons for Ducks in Minnesota

By Jim den Hollander

Editor/Publisher

Saukhockey.info

The Dells Ducks junior hockey team hit the ice for the first time in three weeks with a three-game weekend Jan. 28-30.

After a pair of tough losses on the road against the USPHL Midwest-West Division’s top entry, the Ducks returned home Sunday afternoon to wrap it up with a narrow 3-2 loss to the visiting Steele County Blades.

Sunday’s game went past chippy, teams combining for more than 70 minutes in the sin bin – more than half of those in the third period.

The Ducks spent a large part of the third period shorthanded. The good news for the Ducks was it was able to successfully kill every second of the infractions in the final period and the bad news was it left no time for the team to mount a counterattack to tie the score.

There was no scoring in the third and the Ducks saw a 2-1 lead after a period taken away with two unanswered goals for the Blades in the middle 20.

Jacob Cartland (‘02/Mukwonago, WI) opened the scoring for the Ducks with a shorthanded tally after taking a feed from Justin Green (‘01/Fort Worth, TX) 8:01 into the contest but the Blades struck back less than a minute later on the same powerplay. Cartland’s goal was his 11^th of the season.

Kai Neumaier (‘03/St. Charles, IL) scored on a solo effort with 4:35 to play in the opening period to give the Ducks a lead at the break.

Blades scored before the end of the opening minute of the middle period to knot the score and fired the game winner 6:24 from the end of the frame. The tying goal was a shorthanded effort for Seva Bannikov (‘01/Minsk, Belarus) and the game winner came from Jake Miltko (‘03/Colorado Springs, CO).

Once again, Ducks’ goaltender Drew Moseley (‘02/St. Louis, MO) stepped up in a huge way, stopping all but three of 60 shots faced in goal for the Ducks.

Ducks 2, 3 @ Blue Ox 15, 9

The Blue Ox showed the Ducks on Friday and Saturday nights why they are not only the leaders in the Midwest-West Division but a legit threat at capturing the League’s National Championship in March.

The Ducks opened and closed the scoring in the opening period Friday but in between was five Blue Ox markers, the first three coming together in a span of 53 seconds.

That was the story of the two-game set as the Blue Ox frequently scored in bunches. With a number of new faces in the lineup, it was a tough assignment trying to work the chemistry in a game situation against a team that turned nearly every Ducks’ miscue into a goal.

Cartland started a solid weekend of play with the Ducks’ first goal, the other Ducks’ goal scored by Samuel Soltes (‘04/Trnava, Slovakia) in his first game in North America. Defenseman Gage Senio (‘04/Red Deer, AB) had an assist on both Ducks goals.

Saturday’s game saw a Ducks team determined to keep the game closer and they were successful through the first half of the game.

Down 2-0 after a period, the team went to work and pulled even with goals from Luca Maislin (‘03/Montreal, QC), his third in four games with the team since being acquired from the Florida Eels and defenseman Luke Taylor (‘04/Chandler, AZ).

Assists came from Cartland giving him a point in all three games and Caden Glamkowski (‘04/St. Charles, IL).

The tying goal came three minutes into the second period and stayed in place until the Ox fired four in the final seven minutes of the period and added three more in the third.

The Ducks could take the first two games in stride. Although the first game was its most lopsided loss of the season to date, it chalked up to learning against a solid team that has returned a huge number of players from last season’s team that reached the National Championship tournament.

The loss to the Blades was tough to take, Ducks facing some adversity in the contest with some tough calls on the ice.

They get an immediate shot at redemption though as the team kicks off another three-game weekend with a trip to the Four Seasons Center in Owatonna, MN to play the same Blades on Friday night (Feb. 4). Following that, the team will head north to Blaine for Saturday and Sunday matches against the Minnesota Moose.

The Ducks have eight games remaining in regular season play. This weekend will wrap up its season series with the Moose, leaving two-game weekends in both Wisconsin Rapids and Hudson before wrapping up the campaign on home ice against the Blades Feb. 27.

Below are interviews done before weekend series. For some reason, the preview story and photos did not upload.

Ducks claim win at Showcase finale

By Jim den Hollander

Editor/Publisher

Saukhockey.info

After a pair of hard-fought narrow defeats, the Dells Ducks closed out USPHL Premier play at the annual Chicago Showcase tournament with a lopsided defeat followed by its fourth win of the season.

The Columbus Mavericks from the Great Lakes Division were simply too tough for the Ducks, playing without the services of young defender Jack Kopfstein and goaltender Anthony Falzone, both injured in the earlier matches and joining Kai Neumaier who went to the sidelines a few weeks earlier. The end result was a 10-1 win for the Mavs.

But the team bounced back in its final game, collecting a 5-4 margin against the Wooster Oilers, also from the Great Lakes Division.

The game against the Mavericks was the second of the day Friday (Dec. 17) after an impressive but ultimately unsuccessful 6-5 loss to the Detroit Fighting Irish earlier in the day. On Thursday the team rallied back from a 5-1 deficit before falling in overtime against the Decatur Blaze 6-5.

Ducks 1 Mavericks 10

The Mavericks currently sit third in the Great Lakes Division and strengthened their position with four unanswered first period goals, widening the gap to 6-1 in the second before piling on four more down the stretch.

Caden Glamkowski (‘04/St. Charles, IL) scored the lone goal, making it a 4-1 game early in the second period with his seventh goal of the weekend and 25^th of the season, from Jayden Tkaczuk (‘02/Channahon, IL).

Anthony Falzone and William Carney were peppered with a total of 54 Mavericks’ shots and the Ducks managed just 19 at the other end of the pond.

The game was costly with the injury to Falzone as well as the loss of Bryce Jacobson, forced to sit out the final game of the weekend after a fight.

Ducks 6 Oilers 5

The Ducks and Oilers met for the second time after squaring off at an east coast Showcase event in November. The Ducks won that one 9-2. This one ended up much closer, but the Ducks seemed in control from start to finish, scoring first and carrying a 3-1 lead out of the opening period.

The Oilers held a 3-2 edge through the middle period, closing the game to 5-4 and the Ducks restored its two-goal cushion near the halfway mark of the third before the Oilers made the final 2:37 interesting getting within one shot again.

Glamkowski scored two more goals for the Ducks, matched by Tkaczuk and others came from Seth Stoutenburg (‘03/Roseville, MN) and Jace Weimer (‘05).

The Ducks outshot the Oilers 39-23, snapping a nine-game losing streak and boosting its overall record this season to 4-26-1, one more win than the team collected in 2020-21.

The Ducks players scattered following the Wooster break, returning to their respective hometowns for the Christmas Break. Players will arrive back in town in early January and begin preparations for its final 13 games, starting on home ice with a pair of games against the Minnesota Mullets Jan. 7-8.

Cougars give Ducks rude welcome from break

By Jim den Hollander

Editor/Publisher

Saukhockey.info

The Dells Ducks made its return to action from a brief Thanksgiving Break and got a rude reintroduction in the Windy City.

Playing at Fifth Third Arena, the practice facility of the NHL’s Chicago Blackhawks, the Ducks entered the weekend with some hope, having stunned the Chicago Cougars in the season opener back in September with a 5-4 overtime win.

Dells Ducks

The Ducks opened and closed the scoring in the opening contest, but the Cougars piled up seven in between to rack up the 7-2 win on Saturday afternoon. On Sunday, the Cougars tightened its grip a little further and captured a 12-0 shutout win.

In the Saturday contest, Jayden Tkaczuk (02/Chanahon, IL) responded to anyone wondering if he would be ok following a brutal hit from behind in the team’s last game at the Islanders Hockey Club Showcase in November in the games first two minutes.

Tkaczuk collected his seventh goal of the season, converting a Kai Neuemaier (‘03/St. Charles, IL) feed for the game’s opening goal 90 seconds into the contest.

The Cougars tied the game 50 seconds later and the Ducks never got a sniff of the lead again. The home team was up 3-1 after a period and sank four more unanswered in the middle period, led by TJ Haas who fired three.

Bryce Jacobsen (‘02/DeForest, WI) rounded out the scoring with the lone goal of the final period, his ninth of the season, from Jack Kopfsetein (‘05/Vista, CA) and Gage Senio (‘04/Red Deer, AB)

The Cougars held a massive 54-27 edge in shots including a 28-3 margin through the middle period.

On Sunday, the second period was again a lopsided stretch as the home side turned a 4-0 first period cushion into a 10-0 gap on its way to a 12-0 win and a 60-18 margin on the shot clock.

The wins wrapped up the four-game season series between the Ducks and Cougar, 3-0-1 in Chicago’s favor.

The Ducks will play its first home game in a month and its final home game of 2021 Thursday night when the Wisconsin Rapids Riverkings pay a visit for a rare Thursday night contest at the Lake Delton Ice Arena.

Opening faceoff on Thursday will be 7:30 p.m.

Moseley backstops Ducks’ win against Rum River

By Jim den Hollander

Editor/Publisher

Saukhockey.info

When team snaps a losing streak, it is often said they have shaken a monkey off its back.

The beast perched on the shoulders of the Dells Ducks was evicted as the Ducks earned a 5-4 overtime win against the Rum River Mallards at Isanti Ice Arena against the Rum River Mallards Friday (Nov. 12) night having been there for 15 games.

After climbing off the team’s collective shoulders, he returned to his regular job, swatting at jets and helicopters from the top of the Empire State Building.

A still short-staffed Ducks team hit the road for two games in Isanti in what might seem like an easy weekend after playing three of more games in each of the previous three weekends. They will begin another four-game weekend Thursday.

The team collected its second win of the regular season, shrugging off its lack of numbers and taking the game to the same team that defeated the Ducks 13-4 at the Lake Delton Ice Arena in the opening game of the season in September.

Routinely doubled, tripled or worse on the score sheet, the Ducks battled hard Friday night and held the edge in shots for the first time in 19 games this season, holding a 35-34 margin.

The win in goal was recorded by Drew Moseley who patrolled the crease for the Mallards last season. It was his first win as a Duck and couldn’t have come on a better time.

The shots edge came when Caden Glamkowski buried his team leading 14^th goal of the season with the only shot of the overtime period, helped by Jack Kopfstein and Jayden Tkaczuk.

Both Glamkowski and Tkaczuk wrapped up the game with a goal and three helpers, Kopfstein setting up a pair. The other goals were all the first as a Duck, by Kai Neumaier (‘03/St. Charles, IL) along with Anthony Tuccitto (‘02/Inner Grove Heights, MN). Tuccito has been with the Ducks a short time and played for the Mallards last season. Defender Gage Senio (‘04/Red Deer, AB) scored the other in his first game on the Ducks blueline after starting the 2021-22 season with the Florida Eels.

Bryce Jacobsen and Thomas Howell both collected assists as well for the Ducks.

The Ducks were scheduled to stay in Isanti for a second game Saturday night and attempt to start its first winning streak of the campaign.