Coulee Region had three games scheduled this weekend; they lost Friday and Saturday to Janesville and needed to win Sunday.  They came to play, the Chill skated hard for the first half of the game, but started to slow halfway through the second period.

The first period ended in a 0-0 tie.  The Magicians outshot the Chill 14-7 and had two power plays to one for the Chill.  Neither team played well with the man advantage; the Chill’s penalty kill in the first period was excellent, they stymied the Magicians at their blue line and boxed the Magician forwards out of the slot.

The Chill penalty kill turned in the opening minutes of the second period. Penalties got the best of the Chill penalty kill.  The penalty killers started to tire.  The Chill had just killed the remaining 24 seconds of a Magicians power play in the opening minute of the second period only to draw a second penalty 30 seconds later.

This time the Chill could not stop the Magicians from setting up in the Chill’s zone.  The Magicians moved the puck getting good shots on net for most of their power play.  Still the Chill’s defense held on the penalty kill until with just under 20 seconds left in the penalty, the Magicians hit defenseman Sam Wolf/Eagan on the right point.  Wolf had room and he stepped up blistering a hard shot past the partially screened Chill’s goalie Blake Cates/Stillwater, MN.  That put the Magicians up 1-0.

To the Chill’s credit, they came back immediately.  The Magicians’ lead lasted 10 seconds.  The Magicians’ defense relaxed on the ensuing face off in center ice.  The Chills’ Jesse Tredinnick, a Chill hometown Onalaska, WI player, beat the Magicians’ defense along the left boards and cut to the slot unattended.  He beat Magicians’ goalie Atte Tolvanen with a hard shot right to tie the game 1-1.

The Chill’s defense continued to cut off the Magicians forwards in center ice for the next 10 minutes; but at the 8 minute mark, Matt Colford split the Chills defense at the Chill’s blue line, broke right, and blistered a hard shot to the low left corner.  Cates, the Chill’s goalie, made a great skate save but the puck rebounded to Nick Kuchera in the slot.  Kuchera buried the puck with a quick hard shot past a scrambling Cates.  The Magicians led 2-1.

The Chill was finally tiring and the Magician’s forward were now finding openings.  Will Johnson scored to end the second period with the Magicians leading 3-1.  Jordan Stejskal/Grand Rapids, MN and Matt Colford/Lino Lakes, MN each scored in the third period to end the scoring 5-1.  Magicians win.

The Wilderness closed the gap by beating the Minot Minotauros twice 2-1 in a shootout and 3-2.  They now trail Fairbanks and Kenai River by one point and took third place this week in the Midwest Division.  The two losses extended Minot’s losing streak to six games in the early season.

The Wilderness’ Kasimir Kaskisuo was in the nets for both games.  Kaskisu ran his season record to 6-1-2 giving up an average of 1.19 goals for the nine games he has played.  Kaskisuo has kept his high save percentage (stopping 95% of the shots on goal) and has moved into second place in the NAHL in goal tending.

Coulee Region lost two games to Janesville this past weekend besides losing to the Magicians on Sunday.  They lost to the Jets 5-4 and 4-1.  The Chills defense deserted them on the weekend, giving up 14 goals in their three losses.  The Chill offense outshot Janesville by a total of 82-60 in losing both games.  They were outshot by the Magicians.

The three losses dropped the Chill to .500, but they hung on to fourth place in the division edging the Magicians by a single point.  The Magicians have three games in hand over the Chill having played 11 games to the Chill’s 14.

Wenatchee lost again to NAHL North Division leading teams.  The Wild lost twice to Soo 5-4 and 3-2.  After playing on the road in Michigan the past two weekends, the Wild return to Wenatchee’s Town Toyota Arena for a seven game home stand over the next three weekends; but the opposition does not get weaker.  They entertain division rival Kenai River for three games and division rival Fairbanks for two games.  Michigan is their third opponent three weekends from now.

There is some early separation developing in the young 2013-2014 season.  Most teams will have played one-fourth of their regular season games after this weekend.  Austin, Aberdeen, and Bismarck have taken control of the Central Division; Minot and Brookings are trailing those three by 10 points.

As YHH has been reporting, the Midwest Division has been tight, but some cracks are starting to show.  Wenatchee’s four losses the past to weekends have put the Wild under .500 for the first time and with Kenai River showing up for three games next weekend, the Wild could really start to see the wrong end of the other 5 teams’ breezers.

The North Division has tightened.  Janesville’s double win over Coulee Region last weekend puts all six North Division teams are above .500; but unlike the Midwest Division, Port Huron has posted a 9-2-2 record for 20 points and leads second place Springfield by 5 points.  In the Midwest, the top five teams are separated by 5 points going into next weekend’s action.

Down South, two South Division Kansas teams, Wichita Falls and Topeka, and two Texas teams, Amarillo and Rio Grande Valley are locked in a four way battle for first place separated by a single point.  Corpus Christi, still licking their wounds from their Alaska trip (losing 3 out of 4 games to Kenai River and Fairbanks), were hammered by Amarillo 7-1 and 4-0 last weekend.  Those losses separated the IceRays along with Lone Star and Odessa from the top three by more than 10 points.

Last week’s top scorer Alec Butcher/Kenai River fell into a four player tie for #4 in the league.  That is what happens when your team is idle.  Jay Dickman’s Austin team was not idle, splitting two games with Central Division rival Aberdeen winning 4-1 on Friday and losing 6-2 on Saturday.  Dickman managed to get three assists to gain the top spot in point getters.  He is tied with Matt Sieckhaus/Amarillo with the most points in the league.

Dickman is also tied with two others (Tyler Gernhofer/Amarillo and Stanislav Dzakhov/Bismarck) for the most goals scored in the young season, nine.  France’s Guillaume Leclerc and Dickman’s Austin teammate continues to impress.  Guilaume moved up to tie Butcher for fourth in scoring.

On the goalie side, Amarillo’s Collin Delia won his fifth NAHL game when his team beat Corpus Christi 7-1.  That win propelled Delia to the top of the NAHL goalie rankings.  Delia has a 5-1 record giving up 1.1 goals a game while stopping 96% of the shot on net.  The Wilderness’s Kaskisuo is second this week and last week’s top goalie Chad Catt/Aberdeen dropped to third.  Catt was in the nets for both of the Wings two games against Austin in a weekend battle of the two Central Division leaders and gave up 5 goals.

Atte Tolvanen, the Magicians goalie, made it into the top ten this week with his solid performance in the Magicians 5-1 win over Coulee Region.  Andover’s Chase Perry dropped out of the top ten this week.  Perry was in the nets for Wenatchee’s tough 5-4 loss to the Soo last weekend.

Things will heat up in Minnesota when the Midwest Division leaders, the Fairbanks Ice Dogs, make a return trip.  The Ice Dogs will play Austin on Friday and the Magicians on Saturday (game time 7:05 PM at Richfield).  The game with the Ice Dogs is the only game for the Magicians this coming weekend.

Kenai River and Wenatchee resume their long running rivalry with a three game set played at the Town Toyota Center Arena on the banks of the Columbia River.  These three games will be key to what happens in the Midwest Division.  Wenatchee has struggled playing tough North Division teams in Michigan the last two weekends and need to string some wins together.  A Kenai River sweep would be devastating for the Wild dropping them well off the pace of the two front runners.

The Wilderness will entertain Janesville in a two game set Friday and Saturday at Cloquet’s Northwoods Credit Union arena.  The Janesville team surprised Coulee Region last weekend, but should find it tough going against the Wilderness defense.

Coulee Region needs a few wins to get back into the chase and end up playing Janesville in a rare Thursday game at home before playing Austin Saturday at the Omni Center.

Last week’s games shook up the division, but only a little, as the trailing four teams had chances to catch the idle leaders, Fairbanks and Kenai River.  The pressure this week will be on both leading teams as they show their ability to retain their early season form after a layoff.