Thursday, November 6th, 2014 West Anchorage High School Boys Hockey battled against Lathrop High School. Jack Walters had his first ever high school start in this non-conference varsity hockey game. Walters eventually earned his first win in his first game, however it didn’t come easy as he was challenged quite a bit in the first period.

The final score was a lot closer than the actual game. West started the game-taking penalty after penalty, however they were able to kill off all the penalties in the first. West only took a couple penalties the rest of the game. Lathrop capitalized on one of the power plays in the second period.

The starting goaltenders for each team were freshmen Jack Walters for West and senior Ryan Ebenal for Lathrop. Jack stopped 15 of the 16 shots he faced. Ryan was under constant pressure and managed to stop 42 of 45. Both goalies gave their team a chance to win, but at the end it was West who came out with the victory.

West High absolutely dominated in shots, winning the shot battle 45 to 16. The Eagles had puck possession for the majority of the game and when they didn’t chances are they were on the penalty kill. when asked if he thinks the team should have scored more due to the huge shot lead, the captain of West Dawson Ellingworth, said, “yeah I think we should have scored more, but Ryan Ebenal was playing amazing and kept them in the game.”

Lathrop played a much more disciplined game than West, as they only had four penalty minutes while West had 21 penalty minutes including a five minute major from Kevin Hodsdon. Dawson also said, “I think we took too many unnecessary penalties, but overall it was a good performance by the team.” West had a total of 9 penalties from 6 different people. Lathrop had 2 penalties for a total for 4 penalty minutes from 2 different players.

West High’s defensemen Demetrius Johnson opened up the scoring in the second period. Lathrop was quick to answer with a goal from Arthur Edgren with a pass from Joshua Clifton. It didn’t remain tied for very long as Codie Cope ripped a shot past Ryan Ebenal still in the second period of the game. Cope’s goal would eventually be the game winner but the scoring wasn’t over. Alex Bardsley got the final goal of the game in the third period. The final score was 3-1.

The first period was a pretty close one as West took 7 penalties but it was still pretty even in shots. In the second period the Eagles started taking over the game with their puck possession and good passing. By the third period West had started dominating, and it showed. Lathrop began getting tired due to being forced to take longer shifts because the puck was in their zone.

West had 5 people with a point and 2 people with a multi-point game. Alex Bardsley and Codie Cope each had a goal and an assist. Demetrius Johnson got his lone point with the first goal of the game. Bella Hanson and freshman Tanner Edwards both got an assist in the game. The Eagles captain Dawson Ellingworth said he was, “Really happy with the first week of games, we’re 2-0 so that’s nice but we could be playing better but it’s still early so we can fix our mistakes.” West became 2-0 after the game and they are looking to have another huge season.