Kicking Horse Country hockey fans are once again thrilled with anticipation, as the 2024-25 KIJHL season begins in earnest. After an active and intense training camp and pre-season schedule, the Golden Rockets are entering their 34th year in the league with renewed excitement and determination. Backed by a solid foundation of more than a dozen veteran players returning to the fold and, with the addition of a like number of skilled and talented rookies, the club looks to improve upon every aspect of their game, both offensively and defensively.
Six contests through the pre-season allowed GM/ Head Coach Jed Houseman and his strong management team great opportunity to assess many of the strengths and weaknesses of the players. The team sported a 2W-2L-2OTL record through those early September games.
Last Friday evening, the regular season began with the Rockets travelling down the valley, for a matchup with the Columbia Valley Rockies. The opening period saw Invermere open up a 2-0 lead on the strength of a Carter Krause goal just five minutes in, followed by a Carter Hensch powerplay marker at 17:53. Saskatoon native Riley Deck in the Golden net was simply outstanding between the pipes, turning aside several Columbia Valley drives.
The second period went scoreless, as once again Deck was tested on numerous occasions from in close, keeping his teammates within striking distance. Rockets penalty-kill units were solid, shutting down three separate Invermere powerplays.
In the final frame, Golden’s offence came to life as they managed to break through the Columbia Valley defensive line, and began creating scoring opportunities. It took just :29 seconds for the Rockets to deadlock the game at 2-2 with some great teamwork deep in the opposition end. At 6:49 Rocket’s wiry forward Cooper Thompson finished off a strong powerplay effort with Kanye Huang and Stefan Bodtker, to get Golden on the scoreboard. And then, at 7:17, the opposition was caught napping as newcomer Easton Lee combined with Cameron Whitelaw and Thomas Astley to quickly tie the game. The play then went end-to-end, and proved fairly even for the remainder of regulation time, as this contest needed overtime to declare a winner.
And, in the extra session, Invermere’s speedy forward Bryan Kim struck for what proved to be the winner at 4:07. Final score was 3-2. Columbia Valley outshot Golden 46-31. The Rockets took six out of the fifteen penalties called by referee Gerald Hofferd.
The local stars will be looking to get into the win column this weekend, with a pair of home games in the friendly confines of the Plywood Palace.
Friday, they will be matching skills with the smooth-skating Nelson Leafs from the Neil Murdoch Division, while Saturday evening will see the Doug Birks Division Chase Heat in town playing tough under their new management.
