Philadelphia Blind Hockey Founder McGuire Nominated for NHL’s O’Ree Award

Kelsey McGuire, the founder and executive director of Philadelphia Blind Hockey, has been named as one of three American finalists for the National Hockey League’s Willie O’Ree Community Hero Award Presented by Discover.

The general public my cast votes for the nominee of their choice through May 19. The public’s vote will be combined with votes by NHL executives and O’Ree himself before the winner is announced in June.

Individuals can vote once in each 24-hour period through this link.

https://www.nhl.com/community/willie-oree/willie-oree-community-hero-award

The Willie O’Ree Community Hero Award honors the NHL’s first Back player. O’Ree played in his first NHL game for the Boston Bruins on January 18, 1958 despite being blind in his right eye. His 21-year professional career included 45 NHL appearances, all with the Bruins. The bulk of his career was spent in the Western Hockey League.

For more than 25 years, O’Ree has served as the NHL’s Diversity Ambassador, promoting the importance of inclusion and diversity in the sport.

Hockey Happenings Update 1-14-18

The Game of the Year?

The much-anticipated matchup between Central Bucks South and Pennridge is on tap for Wednesday night. Faceoff is scheduled for 8:40 at Revolution Ice Gardens.

The Titans and the Rams have been the class of the Suburban High School Hockey League’s Class 2A sector all season and this will be their only regular-season meeting. South comes in 10-1 overall and a perfect 6-0 in league play. Pennridge is 9-1 overall, and 5-0 in the league.

As if this game needed any additional buildup (and it doesn’t), Tom Coyne is now behind the bench at Pennridge, having replaced Ken Doak earlier this season. He’ll be coaching against the team he led to two Flyers Cup and state championships.

The winner of this game will likely have the inside lane to the top seed out of the SHSHL for the Flyers Cup tournament. It should also be noted that this game will feature four of the league’s top six Class 2A scorers.

Check back here later tonight for a recap of this game.

Our thanks to the administration at Holy Ghost Prep for their support of this site.

Here are the SHSHL’s leading scorers. Totals include games reported through Friday, January 12.

Class 2A Goals Assists Points

Eric Slater (Pennridge) 19 14 33

Zac Herman (C.R. North) 15 13 28

Matt Stoll (C.B. South) 15 10 25

Matt Meli (C.R. South) 18 5 23

Joe DeLaurentis (C.B. South) 16 5 21

Reis Bracio (C.B. South) 6 13 19

Daniel Guest (C.R. North) 10 8 18

Logan Hurwitz (C.R. North) 5 11 16

Brandon Simmonds (C.R. North) 4 12 16

Class A Goals Assists Points

Bryan Gary (Wiss.) 35 19 54

Sean Gary (Wiss) 25 19 44

Ari Nordinger (U.D.) 22 8 30

Dean Keller (PW) 23 6 29

Perry Carpenter (Ab.) 15 12 27

Jacob Mueller (HH) 13 12 25

Colin Franzoni (PW) 8 15 23

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Michigan Rink Named for Red Berenson

The University of Michigan has officially named its home rink at the Fielding H. Host Field House in honor of longtime coach Red Berenson. The Red Berenson Rink was officially dedicated on Friday night before the Wolverines faced Notre Dame.

Berenson coached the Wolverines for 33 years before retiring following the close of the 2017 season with a record of 848-429-92. His teams won national championships in 1996 and ’98, reached the national championship game in 2011, and qualified for the Frozen Four on eight other occasions.

Before going into coaching Berenson played in the NHL for all or part of 17 seasons. and scored 261 goals while adding 397 assists for 658 points in 987 games in an era where there wasn’t as much scoring as there is today

Readers of this blog will likely most remember him as a member of the expansion-era St. Louis Blues and a tormenter of the Philadelphia Flyers in their infancy. He helped lead the Blues to the Stanley Cup finals in the first three years of their existance.

He also played in the Canada-Soviet Union series in the fall of 1972.

And perhaps just as importantly, he played in the first NHL game I ever saw.

What is often forgotten is that Berenson was not only an All-American at Michigan but earned his degree as well.

In light of Berenson’s considerable success as a coach it’s easy to overlook his contributions got the game of hockey in other areas. But those contributions should never be forgotten,

We feel it’s important for today’s athletes to be aware of the history of their sport, and learn about the contributions of those that came before them.

Two Hockey Players With Local Ties Headed To Olympic Games

Two players with connections to the Suburban High School Hockey League will be part of the American team that will skate in the Olympic Games in Pyeongchang, South Korea.

Yardley, Pa. native and Germantown Academy graduate Brian O’ Neill, a forward will be joined by defenseman Ryan Gunderson, a Bensalem native and a Holy Ghost Prep graduate.

This will mark the first time since 1994 that NHL players will not be competing in the Olympics. The bulk of the American squad is playing professionally in Europe.

The 32-year old Gunderson is skating for Brynäs IF in the Swedish Hockey League, the top professional league in Sweden. He played college hockey at Vermont and set a school record by appearing in 148 games for the Catamounts.

He played professionally with the Trenton Devils in in the East Coast Hockey League before moving on to Sweden, where he helped Brynäs IF win a league title in 2012.

The 29-year old O’Neill is playing for Jokerit in the Kontinental Hockey League, which is based in Russia but has teams in Western Europe as well; Jonjerit is based in Helsinki, Finland.

O’Neill played college hockey at Yale where he tied a record for games played (138) and left with the second highest point total in school history. He was named the Ivy League player of the year in 2012 before signing with the NHL’s Los Angeles Kings and helping their American Hockey League affiliate, the Manchester Monarchs, win the Calder Cup three years later.

A total of 706 NHL players have competed over the course of the last five Olympiads. League officials and club owners felt that participating in the upcoming Games would not be in the league’s best interests, citing the break in the schedule among other things.

This year’s Games get underway on February 9. The U.S. hockey team, which being coached by former NHL standout Tony Granato will play its first preliminary game in the 12-team tournament on February 14 against Slovenia before playing additional games against Slovakia on February 16 and Russia on the 17^th.