Junior Hockey Blog

The MT State High School Wrestling Tournament concluded two days ago. Billings Senior High won class AA. It was the first time that the Broncs won it since 1956!! In class A it was the Havre Blue Ponies winning it all. And in Class BC it was the Colstrip Colts winning it all. Two new 4 time individual champs were crowned. Belgrade's Jarrett Degan and Forsyth's Luke Weber each became 4 time Champions this weekend!! Congratulations to all the wrestlers on a great season!!

The 2015 MT State wrestling Tournament concluded yesterday. In AA action It was Great Falls winning the team title with Billings Senior coming in 2nd. In class A it was Havre winning with Sidney coming in 2nd. And in class BC it was Choteau winning with Colstrip coming in second. Sidney wrestler Gresh Jones won the 126 lb. title. He is the 24th four time state champ in MT history. He is going to wrestle for the University of Minnesota next year. Minutes later Matt Weber became the 25th four time champ in MT when he defeated Choteau's JJ Werdal for the 138 pound championship. Joneses was in class A, Weber's was in BC. In the class A 138 pound final Shonn Roberts of Columbia Falls was going for his 4th title - he was pinned by Jarret Degan of Belgrade in the final. This was Jarret Degans 3rd title and he will be going for his fourth next year.

In 1974-75 Billings had the Billings Blazers of the SWHL. They competed against teams from Butte, Albequerque, El Paso, and Amarillo. All the teams and the league are defunct. From 1976-82 The Billings Bighorns played in the WHL. Even though the Bighorns left town - there are still 5 teams playing in that same league today that played against the Bighorns. They are the Brandon Wheat Kings, the Regina Pats, the Saskatoon Blades, The Medicene Hat Tigers, and The Portland Winterhawks. In 1983-84 The Montana Magic played in the CHL. They played against Colorado, Tulsa, Salt Lake City, and Indianapolis. The league folded but the Tulsa Oilers played on and are still playing today in the ECHL. In 1985-86 the Billings Marlboros played briefly in the Continental Hockey League which had since folded. In 1993 The Billings Bulls came to town and even though they have been a part of 6 different leagues they have played 22 straight years in Billings. I may be missing a few but here are some of the teams that they used to play against that are still around. They competed against the Bismarck Bobcats in the old AWHL and the NAHL from 1996-2006 - Bismarck is still in the NAHL today. They competed against the Fairbanks Ice Dogs from 2000-2006 in the same leagues and Fairbanks is still in the NAHL today. The Wichita Falls Wildcats were with the Bulls in the NAHL from 2003-2006 and they are still in the NAHL today. From 1999-2002 The Kimberly Dynamiters wer in the old AWHL, and from 1999-2005 the Fernie Ghostriders were in the old AWHL and later the NAHL. Those two teams are still alive today. They both are playing in the KIJHL up in Canada. The Missoula Maulers played in the Nor Pac hockey league and the Newer AWHL with the Bulls from 2007-2012 and they currently play in the WSHL. Speaking of the Nor Pac hockey league they no longer have any teams that the Bulls played against, But former Billings Bulls player Brian Moon owns the Cheney Ice Hawks one of the current Nor Pac teams. Last but not least the Helena Bighorns, Bozeman Ice Dogs, and the Great Falls Americans still compete against the Bulls in the NA3HL hockey league. The Bighorns and Ice Dogs continuously since the 90s, where as the Americans played in the old AWHL and NAHL in the 90s and early 2000s then went dormant for 10 years or so and have been back with the Bulls for the last 3 years. If I missed anybody I am sorry - but hopefully I came close to covering most of the teams we played against that are still in existance today!!

The Boulder Arrowhead little league team qualified for the semi finals at the Northwest Little League tournament in San Bernadino CA. They lost to the number one seed from Washington state 10-3. In other baseball news, The Colorado Rockies sent their first baseman Michael Cuddyer to the Pioneer leagues Grand Junction Rockies for a rehab stint. They happened to be playing the Billings Mustangs in Billings MT. The fans got to see him play in two games and he signed autographs for about 30 minutes before the games and approximately 30-35 minutes after the games!!

The Billings Royals and the Laurel Dodgers each finished in second place in their respective state legion tournaments. The Billings Royals lost 3-2 to the Missoula Mavericks in the Championship game in Legion AA. The Laurel Dodgers lost 8-4 to the Glacier Twins in the class A Championship game. In little league action - the Boulder Arrowhead All Stars from Billings are currently playing in the Northwest Regional Tournament in San Bernadino CA. In pool play they are 1-1. They Defeated Idaho 13-7 in their first game, and then lost to Washingto 10-4 in 9 innings in their second game. They have two more pool play games against Oregon and Alaska - if they can win one of those two they will almost guarantee themselves a berth in the semi finals of the Northwest regional tournament!!

The MT State high school wrestling tourney took place last weekend in Billings. The Great Falls Bison were the AA champs. The Havre Blue Ponies won class A. The Colstrip Colts won class B. The Belt Huskies won class C. Some noteable events were, for the first time ever a girl placed at state - Laurel's Abi Gontarek took 5th place at 98 lbs. Huntley Project's Koni Dole, who only has one leg, took 3rd place, and for the first time ever two brothers squared off for a state championhip. Havre's Tyler Adams defeated his younger brother Travis 14-5 to win the 220 lb. Championship in class A. Speaking of brothers once again the Forsyth Dogies Weber brothers (all 3 of them) won state championships, but it wasn't enough to give Forsyth a title - they finished 3rd behind Colstrip and Choteau.

In 2006-07 Tyler Johnson played for the Couer D' Alene Lakers of the Tier 3 Junior A Nor Pac Hockey League, consisting of teams from Montana, Idaho, Washington, and Wyoming. The Spokane native has worked his way up the ladder and six years later has been called up to the Tampa Bay Lightning of the NHL. I dont know if he is the only Nor Pac player to make it to the NHL but there are not many others if he is not the only one so far. Congrats to Tyler on making it to the NHL!!

It has been an exciting year for Billings baseball teams!! In Little League action, Big Sky of Billings 11-12 year olds won state and got to go to San Bernadino CA where they went 3-3 and took 2nd place in their regional, just missing out on a trip to Williamsport. The Billings Royals won State and went to Regionals in Eugene, OR and went 1-2 at their tournament. The Laurel Dodgers won State in their division and went 3-2 in their regional tournament in Wheatland WY. Congrats to all the teams on a great season!! And in non baseball news, Billings native Matt Rose who played for the Gillette Wild of the AWHL for the last two years has accepted a full ride scholarship to play hockey for Division 3 Northland College of Wisconsin!! Congrats to Matt as well!!!

Former Billings Senior High School soccor star Nich Pertuit has been kicking field goals for the San Jose Sabercats of the Arena Football League. The Sabercats have made the playoffs so hopefully Nich can nail some game winning field goals for the Sabercats this playoff season!! Also Butte native Dax Deadrick who played Tier 3 hockey for the Boulder Bison of the WSHL for the last 2 years has signed on to play Goalie for the Central Wisconsin Saints of the MnJHL. While the MnJHL is still Tier 3 it is a definite step up from the WSHL as far as his chances of getting a college scholarship to play hockey. Congrats to both Nich and Dax on their successes in their respective sports!!

The Alabama-Huntsville Chargers have named former Billings Bulls head coach Mike Corbett as their new head coach. Corbett coached the Billings Bulls in 200-2001. Also the Omaha Lancers of the USHL have named former Billings Bulls player Brian Kaufmann as their new head coach. Congrats to both Mike and Brian on their new positions!!

In the recently completed NCAA Wrestling Tournament ironically their were 4 wrestlers with ties to Billings MT who were ALL in the 125 pound weight class. Trent Sprenkle who wrestles for North Dakota State is from Billings MT. He graduated in 06 from Billings Senior High where he was a 3 time MT state Champ. He took 5th in the Nation. Matt McDonough who wrestles for Iowa, is a two time defending champ, went 3-2 in the tourney. Matt has worked as a counselor at a summer wrestling camp in Billings for the last 3 summers!! Tyler Cox who wrestles for Wyoming went 2-2 at the tourney is from Gillette WYO, when he was in high school he wrestled at the Billings invitational. Jade Rauser went 1-2 at the NCAAs - he is from Townsend MT and he won 3 of his 4 State High School Championships in Billings at the Metra!! Congrats to all four of them!!!!

In the March 4th Hockey News there is a story about former Bozeman Ice Dog Zach McKelvie. After playing for Bozeman in 05-06,he played for 4 years for Army. He now plays in the AHL. Also, in Mt Hockey news Anthony Petruzelli formerly of the Helena Bighorns has gotten a D1 scholarship to play for Vermont next year!!

The MT State High School Wrestling tournament has concluded with Great Falls High winning the AA title, Havre winning the class A title, and Forsythe winning the class B-C title. There were no 4 time individual Champions this year. Three brothers from Forsythe were State Champs, Matt Weber at125, Luke Weber at135, and Brandon Weber at 152.

First, The Seattle Thunderbirds of the WHL have traded Billings MT native Jake Doty to the Medicene Hat Tigers. Jake grew up in Billings and had previously played for the Billings Bulls and the Yellowstone Quake of the Nor Pac hockey league. He has NHL potential. Second, The Bozeman Ice Dogs of the AWHL have signed goaltender Jude Hull. No, he is not a MT native, He is however the son of former NHLer Brett Hull and the grandson of former NHLer Bobby Hull!!

The Arizona Diamondbacks have called up outfielder Tyler Graham to the major leagues. Tyler was born and raised in Great Falls MT. He attended CMR High School. He played college Baseball at Oregon State. He was drafted by the SF Giants and had been in their miner league system for several years, having just been released by them earlier in the summer of 2012. The AZ Diamondbacks picked him up after SF waived him, and now he has been called up to their big league club!!

The Billings MT Boulder Arrowhead Little League team won the MT state Championship and went on to the Northwest Regional Tourney in San Bernadino CA. They went 2-2 in pool play and went on to the Semi-Finals where they lost 3-2 to Post Falls Idaho. They were 2 wins away from being just the second team ever from MT to go to Williamsport PA. (Last years Billings team went 3-1 at The Little League World Series). In Legion Baseball action, The Billings Royals were the MT State Champs and the Billings Scarlets took second. The Northwest Regional Tournament is being held here in Billings with both teams playing. The Royals qualified as State Champs and the Scarlets as the host team. They both finished with 1-2 records. Oregon, Idaho, Hawaii, and Washington are currently still alive in the tourney and are battling it out for a chance to advance to the Legion Baseball World Series!!

I just heard the news that former NHL player Pavel Bure has made the Hockey Hall of Fame!! In October of 1992 I took a road trip up to Vancouver Canada to see the Canucks play the Oilers and I got to see Pavel play live in person! That is awesome and exiting news that he has made the Hall of Fame!!

Anthony Petruzelli led the Helena Bighorns of the Nor Pac Hockey league to a National Championship in 2010-11. This year he moved up from USA Tier 3 to a Canadien Tier 2 team, The Brooks Bandits of the Alberta Hockey League. The Brooks Bandits and the AJHL just concluded their regular season and Anthony was named Rookie of the Year for the whole league! Congrats to Anthony!!

In 1977-78 in the WHL the Lethbridge Broncos goalie Gord Garbutt had a steller year. I remember him coming down to Billings and shutting out the Billings Bighorns while making several outstanding saves. Even though he never made it to the NHL he had a good minor league career. Fast forward 34 years later, his son Ryan Garbutt scored his first NHL goal!! Ryan, who played college hockey for Brown University, got called up by the Dallas Stars and scored a goal in his first game. Dallas beat Montreal 3-0. His dad Gord was there to see it live in Montreal!!

The 2012 Wrestling season has concluded with Kalispel Glacier winning the AA, Corvalis winning the class A, and the BC champs are the Forsyth Dogies. There were 4 Champions who won for their Fourth time, bringing that total to 23 in the history of Montana wrestling.

Of the 23 four time state champs there are 3 who went undefeated for their entire high school careers. They are Gene Davis of Missoula who graduated in 1963, Beau Malia from Billings Skyview who graduated in 2004, and Jade Rauser who graduated from Townsend in 2011.

However their are two reasons why Ben Stroh of Chinook (This years 189 pound 4 time champ headed for Wyoming to wrestle collegiately) could arguably be considered the best ever. First, the vast majority of the others started out their careers as 98 pound freshman, thus their first years tourney was spent wrestling against other freshman and not versus bigger and stronger upper classmen. Ben wrestled at 160 pounds his freshman year. He wrestled at 171 his Sophmore year, and then 189 his junior and senior years.

Secondly, and most astonishingly he set a NATIONAL record by winning his last 101 matches in a row BY PIN!!! For the last 2 years plus - he not only went undefeated, but he beat EVERY SINGLE opponent by PINNING them!!!

Anyway, Congratulations go out to this years 4 four time state champs. They are Luke Schlosser of Conrad, Cole Mendenhall of Great Falls, Luke Zieger of Glasgow, and as previously mentioned, Ben Stroh of Chinook.

The Buffalo Sabres have called up Derek Whitmore from the AHL. He played for the Butte Irish of the old AWHL in 2001-2002.

Some other notables from the old AWHL to make it to the NHL are Former Billings Bulls goalie Chris Holt who played for the NY Rangers, Former Great Falls American Pat Dwyer who plays for the Carolina Hurricanes, and former Fernie Ghostrider goalie David LeNeveau who played for the Pheonix Coyotes.

Once again congratulations to Derek Whitmore on getting called up to the Buffalo Sabres!

At the NCAA Wrestling Finals in Philadelphia there were 3 Montana wrestlers competing last weekend.

Trent Sprenkle from Billings competed for the ND State Bison and went 3-2, Vince Salminen also from Billings and from NDSU went 0-2, and Cole Dallasera from Butte competed for Wyoming and went 2-2.

Penn State won the team title with Cornell finishing 2nd and Iowa finishing 3rd.

While the Billings Bulls season is over, Former goalie Eddie Fritz who was traded to El Paso of the Western States Hockey League is going to Nationals in April with his new team, the El Paso Rhinos.

The El Paso Rhinos won their playoff series two games to zero over the Boulder Bison and are moving on to the WSHL Championship series versus the Idaho Jr. Steelheads. Both teams will be going to Nationals!

A little closer to home, The Helena Bighorns and the Seattle Totems are playing in the Nor Pac league finals with both teams having already qualified for Nationals. Former Billings Bulls player Stormy Knight is a member of the Seattle Totems.

Best of luck to all these teams at Nationals in April!!

While enjoying a free preview weekend of NHL Center Ice on DISH Network I flipped to between periods coverage of the Boston Bruins VS New Jersey Devils game and the studio host was none other than former Boston Bruin/Billings Bighorn player Gord Kluzak.

Kind of neat to see a former player like that!

The Nor Pac hockey league just finished their inaugural showcase tournament here in Billings MT. Eighteen games in 3 days. The Eastern division went 16-2 versus the West. The attendence figures for the 3 Bulls games at the Metra were 505, 1382, and 1309. The Bulls beat Medford OR 10-2, then they beat Seattle 4-1, and then on the final day they lost to Puget Sound 5-2.

The league said they were pleased with how well the tournament was run and many people in Billings hope that it will be back here again next year.

First off, Billings native and former Yellowstone (Cody, Wyo.) player Jake Doty has tried out for and made the Seattle Thunderbirds of the WHL. The WHL is a Major Junior Canadien Hockey League that often times feeds NHL rosters down the road.

Speaking of the NHL, They have just announced the hiring of Billings native Bryan Pancich as a linesman for the 2009-10 season. Bryan was a linesman last season in the USHL -- A Tier 1 Major Junior American League.

Congrats to both Jake and Bryan!!!

Updating my last post:

The Billings Scarlets lost their next game and finished the tourney 2-2. Not bad.

The Boulder Arrowhead Little League team went 3-2 for the tourney losing their last game 9-7 to Salem Oregon.

The Laurel Dodgers class A Legion team lost to Kennewick WA 7-6 in the Regional Final. They took 2nd place capping off a great season.

Ussually when a Montana team makes it to a regioal tournament they pretty much go 0-2 and are done save for when we get to play Alaska then they go 1-2 and are done.

This year has definitely been an exception to the rule.

The Billings Scarlets American Legion team so far is 2-1 at their Regional Tourney in Oregon and looking to keep on winning and hopefully get a chance to make it to the Legion World Series see what happens with that. In the early sixties the Billings Royals took second in the Legion World Series led by Pitcher Dave McNally, losing to Louisiana in the championship game.

The Laurel Dodgers class B American Legion team are 2-0 in their regional and are hoping to continue their winning ways.

The Billings-Boulder Arrowhead boys little league team is also 2-0 in their regional and not only have a shot at the Little League World series in Williamsport PA but also have a shot at making it on ESPN2 for their regional final which even if they lose they still will have made it on to National TV.

Speaking of Dave McNally (who sadly passed away in 2002) his brother owns the Ford dealership here in Billings. The name of the business is Archie Cochrane Ford. Archie Cochrane was the brother of former major league catcher Mickey Cochrane, who played in the 1920's and 30's. Incidentally, Mickey Mantle is named after Mickey Cochrane. Wow, small world!!!

The other night on ESPNClassic they had what appeared to be a bootleg video from the late 70's of Nick Bockwinkle and Ray the Crippler Stevens VS The Crusher and Dick The Bruiser in a cage match.

It appeared to be filmed by a fan from the front row. The Crusher and The Bruiser defeated Bockwinkle and Stevens and bloodied them up pretty good to boot. Also as an added bonus they beat up Bobby The Brain Heenen when he tried to interfere.

While this was fun to watch now, it would have been 'The absolutely, positively, coolest thing in the whole world' if I had gotten to see it Thirty years ago!

The Billings Bulls have announced that they are going to host a 3 Day 18 game league showcase January 7-9, 2010 at both the Metra and Centennial Ice Arenas.

All games count in the standings. The Nor-Pac Junior Hockey league has two divisions of 6 teams each and with VERY few exceptions the teams in the East almost never play the teams from the West. Each team in the league will play 3 games against teams from the other division. There will be scouts from the NAHL, USHL, and several colleges in attendance. With two rinks 5 minutes apart from each other this is an ideal place to hold such a major event such as this.

In addition to the Showcase the Bulls will also play two additional home games on Metra Ice on Dec. 31 and Jan. 2nd versus teams in their division, presumably Bozeman and Helena.

Billings Bulls goalie Tim Gerrish has signed a letter of intent to play for the Southern Maine Huskies for the fall of 2009. He is from Albany NY, so he will definitely be a little closer to home.

Congratulations and best wishes for success to Tim and the Huskies!