The young and reckless

Dukes battle through mistakes on way to five-game winning streak

They’re young. Most Dukes players on the current roster were born in this millennium. They play young. Reckless. Easily confused. Still saddled by the bad habits learned in minor hockey.

Yet here they are. Sitting atop the East Division with a widening chasm between them and second place Cobourg. The Dukes are second overall in the OJHL, on the back of a five-game winning streak. Here they are.

Still, these young Dukes make mistakes. Plenty of them. Simple, mindless stuff. Just clear the zone. Your team is under pressure within striking distance of your net. The puck is on your stick. Your only job is to get it out—over the blue line. It’s called the neutral zone because there is almost no threat to score between the blue lines. But it doesn’t happen. Once. Twice. Fail. The puck is behind your netminder.

More times than you could count, the Dukes coughed up pucks within a few feet of their blueline on Sunday. Three times such errors turned into goals. For the other side. Inside 14 minutes, the Dukes were trailing 3-0.

But here is the thing about this young team, they believe in salvation. In redemption. They believe in themselves.

The Wellington Dukes aren’t a good team. Not yet. But they can be. And may become one soon. For they have that other thing that defines youth—a strong and powerfully beating heart. A willingness to compete and the belief they can overcome any obstacle— confidence in their invincibility.

It has propelled them into first place. It will take more than this for them to stay on top. We shall see how quickly these Dukes can shed their young boy ways.

DUKES 4 – NORTH YORK 0
Creed Jones was the show on Friday night. North York came into Wellington confident they would emerge with a win against the young Dukes. They had edged the Dukes in Buffalo a few weeks earlier and they were riding a hot netminder in Jett Alexander.

The Rangers came at Wellington during every shift early in the game. But Dukes netminder Jones was spectacular. Wellington fans had witnessed the ability of this remarkable netminder in preseason. But in his last outing in Wellington, against Kingston in mid-September, Jones had messed the bed badly, allowing four goals in 14 minutes.

On Friday, he went in pursuit of redemption— stealing certain goals from the Rangers’ skilled snipers. Over and over again. Sixteen shots in the first period. Nothing.

The Dukes didn’t get a lot of chances in the first, but the ice opened up a bit in the second.

Still the Rangers kept coming—bolstered by a power play and then a two-man advantage. Tripping and slashing. The worst kind.

Jones, however, was allowing nothing past him.

Meanwhile Mitchell Martan had another strong game. He worked the puck deep into the North York zone. Pulled the puck loose. Over to Teddy McGeen. Back to Zach Uens on the blueline. The lanky young defenceman has a surprisingly good (accurate and hard) shot from the point. This one weaved through traffic, into the North York net. The Dukes had the lead.

Later, Martan and Captain Colin Doyle were back in the North York end. Martan simply outworked the defence along the wall—emerging with the puck. Out to Doyle. Bingo bango. The Dukes had a two-goal lead.

McGeen scored a power play goal later in the second, widening the Dukes’ lead 3-0. Still North York kept coming. They had played well. Their netminder had been strong. If they could beat Jones once, they might climb back into this game.

Leadership: Earning six points in three games last weekend, Colin Doyle demonstrated why he leads the East Division-leading Wellington Dukes. After he scored the go-ahead goal on Sunday against Aurora, he turned immediately and pointed at Keegan Ferguson, the blueline who had fed him a brilliant pass, disguised as a slap shot on net. In that gesture, Doyle was giving his defender full credit for the goal.

The Dukes presented the Rangers with yet another two-man advantage in the second. A gift. This time for more than a minute. But the Dukes netminder was rock solid. And the team defended like badgers.

Alec Tiley scored in the third, crushing the Rangers’ hopes of any comeback. As the game wore down, North York’s snipers pulled out every trick, every dangle, in an effort to get one puck past Jones. It was no use.

Jones earned the Dukes’ first shutout as Wellington skated to a 4-0 win. Jones was an easy choice as player of the game.

WELLINGTON 6 – AURORA 5
It was a win. Two points. But this wasn’t a game you will tell your kids about. In fact, the Dukes seemed inclined to give the win to the visiting Tigers early in the game. Nicely packaged. A tidy bow. A welcome-tothe- County memento.

Now, given the choice, it is not uncommon for young men to choose the easy route, preferring cleverness to hard work. Slick rather than smart. The low percentage holiday-in-Europe pass, over the safe, incremental chip up the wall. At this level of hockey, however, learning the difference is what separates the kids who move upward and those who drift sideways.

That lesson came hard, and often, on Sunday. The Dukes seemed intent on turning the puck over to the aggressive forechecking Tigers. Repeatedly. And through much of the first period Wellington had no response. The game wasn’t 15 minutes old and Aurora had a 3-0 lead. It wasn’t Jonah Capriotti’s doing. He was in the Dukes net for the first time in Wellington. But you can only cough up the puck so many times in your own end before opponents find a way to put it in your net.

Then a break. Zach Uens released a wobbler from the point that found its way through traffic and into the Tigers’ net—his second goal in two games. It was just the Dukes’ fourth shot of the game. Then Daniel Panetta scored. The Dukes’ fifth shot.

It was apparent that if they put pucks on the Tigers’ netminder they might climb out of this self-dug hole. Indeed, early in the second Martan scored to tie the game. Midway through the period came one of the prettiest goals so far in this young season. Martan, Doyle and McGeen were moving the puck well, as they had all game long. McGeen back to Keegan Ferguson on the blueline. He pulled back to let a shot go on net. Instead, it was a hard pass to Doyle poised at the back door. One timer. Goal. The Dukes had the lead for the first time in the game.

But then a fluke Tiger goal—a shot from the point hit the Dukes defenceman’s shin pad and slipped past a helpless Capriotti—drew the Tigers even again at four goals apiece.

The Dukes Graeme McCrory scored his first OJHL goal to restore the lead midway through the last period. Andrew Rinaldi, on a powerful individual rush added an insurance marker. It’s a good thing he did. Aurora pulled their netminder and pressed hard, looking for—and finding—a goal, drawing them within a goal of tying the game with more than two minutes on the clock.

The Dukes tightened up for the assault. But then McGeen broke loose with the puck out of the Dukes corner and with astonishing speed found daylight in the neutral zone. He fired the puck into the empty net. But missed.

Still, the Dukes managed to weather the onslaught and steal the win—their fifth in a row.

UP NEXT: KINGSTON, STOUFFVILLE AND MARKHAM
The Dukes travel to Kingston on Thursday. The Voyageurs have won just one of their last five games. Both Kingston netminders own a goals-against-average north of four. Kington’s roster of 19 and 20-yearolds is underperforming. Yet they played Wellington tough last month—chasing Jones from the net in the first period. It will be interesting to see who gets the start in the Dukes net on Thursday night.

On Friday, the Dukes welcome the Stouffville Spirit to Wellington. The Spirit are a mid-pack team so far this season. While they beat Markham on Saturday, they dropped a 7-3 decision to Lindsay the night before.

And on Thanksgiving Sunday, the Dukes welcome the Markham Royals to Wellington for a 2 p.m. start. The Royals are second in the north division, having won four of their last five games. The Dukes edged the Royals 4-3 in double overtime last month. Eric Uba notched the overtime winner.