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CHL Central Hockey League

Shots from the Point

March 13, 2009 - Central Hockey League (CHL) News Release


1- The Northeast Division will see three teams in the playoffs, the Oklahoma City Blazers, Bossier-Shreveport Mudbugs and Mississippi RiverKings yet the division winner is not yet determined. The RiverKings currently lead the division by four points over the Blazers and five points over the Mudbugs. It may appear that the 'Bugs are in the worst spot but they do have four head-to-head games remaining with the RiverKings including two games this weekend at the DeSoto Civic Center. The 'Kings have won back-to-back games against the Mudbugs outscoring them 10-3. Oklahoma City plays at Rapid City on Saturday and at Colorado on Sunday.

2- The Arizona Sundogs are still trying to qualify for the final spot remaining of the 10 teams heading to the Ray Miron President's Cup Playoffs. They head into this weekend's home-and-home series versus the New Mexico Scorpions tied with Corpus Christi for the final spot. The 'Dogs have just four games remaining in the regular season, all versus New Mexico. After this weekend's games, the Sundogs will play at the Santa Ana Star Center next Friday and Saturday. The Scorps are not out of it yet and the eight points on the board versus Arizona could very well be the make or break for New Mexico. The Sundogs are 4-2-0 in the season series versus New Mexico.

3- With much determined for the 2009 CHL Playoffs, two teams have yet to have their place in the screenplay presented to them, the Rio Grande Valley Killer Bees and the Corpus Christi IceRays. The Southeast Division rivals have met 10 times this season with RGV winning seven of those games. The clubs will play Friday and Saturday at the American Bank Center this weekend and March 20th at the Dodge Arena. The Rays are coming off a 7-5 loss at Odessa last night and are sitting tied with Arizona for the final playoff spot. The Killer Bees have the same record as the Laredo Bucks for the third spot in the South but a two point penalty for using an ineligible player has them two points behind and in the fourth spot. The six points remaining to be decided between the two rivals will mean tons as we head to the final week of the season. Both games in Corpus this weekend can be seen LIVE on the CHL Network.

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INSIDE THE NUMBERS

9 The number of combined second period goals scored between the Jackalopes and IceRays during last night's 7-5 Odessa win over Corpus Christi...One more than the season-high of eight combined in a period back on October 18th when Corpus Christi had seven and Tulsa had one in the third period of the Rays 12-3 victory...Last night, the Jacks had five and the Rays had four during the nine-goal outburst

4 The current win streaks of the Oklahoma City Blazers and the Rio Grande Valley Killer Bees who both are chasing teams in their division...The Blazers are four points behind Mississippi for the NE Division lead and the Bees are two points behind Laredo for the third seed in the South

9-5-1 The record of the New Mexico Scorpions since the beginning of February....The Scorps have points in six of their last eight games (5-2-1) and are four points behind both Arizona and Corpus Christi for the fifth and final South playoff spot

89 The number of points that the CHL point leader Sebastien Thinel (Odessa) has leading the race for the Joe Burton Scoring Championship by 14 points over Tulsa's Jeff Christian (75 points)...Thinel has five goals and nine assists in his last six games...Thinel's 36 goals lead the league by two over Arizona's Joel Irving, Laredo's Darryl Smith and Colorado's Ryan Tobler and his 53 helpers are two better than Colorado's Kevin Ulanski and Ed McGrane

0-4-1 The Laredo Bucks record over their last five games (the second longest losing streak in franchise history)...The Bucks have only once in their history lost five or more games in a row with that time being October 29th - November 12th/2004 when they dropped six straight games...The Bucks play at Amarillo on Friday looking to put an end to their losing streak

TIDBITS

-The OKC Blazers are 13-2-3 versus teams of the Northwest Division and this weekend will play at Rapid City and Colorado

-The Odessa Jackalopes lead the league with 100 power play goals, 16 more than Texas who has the second most PPG's...The Jacks 22.1% success rate on the power play is tops in the league and they have been remarkably consistent at home and on the road scoring 52 at the Jack Shack and 48 away from home...Sebastien Thinel leads the team with 20 goals on the man advantage and Kory Karlander is second on the team with 15

-Colorado's Riley Nelson and Oklahoma City's Ted Vandermeer each have scored goals in four straight games...The league's longest goal scoring streak of the season is six games reached five times

-The CHL year-end awards will be announced beginning on Monday, March 16th and run through Monday, March 23rd with the announcement of the CHL Most Valuable Player

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Central Hockey League Stories from March 13, 2009


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