Royals Highlights

By Josh Martin, Sports Editor

Men’s Volleyball - Lost 3-2 to the
COTR Avalanche on Friday, January 14
and won the following day in their,back-
to-back game 3-1. They are currently at
second spot in the standings with a 6-2
record.

Men’s Basketball — They won their first
decision against the Langara Falcons
on the Friday night, 74-69 for their
third win of the season but then lost on
the following night 59-76. They sit at

 

seventh spot in the standings out of 10
and have a 3-6 record and six points.
Women’s Volleyball — They got their
first two wins of the season last weekend
against the COTR Avalanche. They won
both decisions 3-2 and sit seventh in the
standings with four points.

Women’s Basketball — Lost both
contests against the Langara College
Falcons 36-68 on the first night and
then 42-73 on the following night which
increased their losing record to 0-9,
good for dead last in the league.

 

Salo’s future in doubt...in more ways than one

By David Hollinshead

ancouver Canucks defenseman

Sami Salo may be done for the

season due to the Achilles injury
he suffered in the summer playing floor
hockey. So far Salo has missed every
game of the 2010/2011 season with this
injury, leaving the Canucks calling upon
Andrew Alberts and Aaron Rome to fill
his spot by committee.

Salo, who turned 36 this September,
is in what is quite possibly the final year
of his eight year stint with the Canucks,
and the question is, do the Canucks want
him back? Salo has not completed an
entire NHL season in his career and is
one of the most oft-injured players in the
NHL. Despite this, he still boasts one of
the better slap shots in the league and has
amounted 81 goals and 273 points in 665
career games.

His age comes deeply into
consideration when Mike Gillis and the
rest of the Canuck management team
are deciding whether to resign him at
the end of this year or not. Alberts, a
trade-deadline pickup last year, has
stepped into the shoes of Salo quite well

and is becoming a dependable depth
defenseman, despite struggling when the
organization acquired him last year. He
splits shifts with the young Aaron Rome,
who is progressing more and more in the
Canucks line-up.

In the Canucks farm team, the
Manitoba Moose, lie other Canuck
prospects that are making leaps to join
the line-up. Yann Sauvé, drafted by the
Canucks in 2008 in the second round, has
potential to be a good two-way defender
but still needs time in the minors to
develop his offensive game. The Canucks
also have former Vancouver Giants d-man
Kevin Connauton, drafted by Vancouver
in 2009, who possesses the offensive
potential to replace Salo on the power
play with a powerful and effective slap
shot with a bit more development. The
downfall of Connauton is that he isn’t
as good defensively as the Canucks
would like as he is not an overly physical
player and will require some seasoning
in the minors as well before being called
up. With an already deep blue line for
the Canucks, and a bevy of promising
prospects in Manitoba, it leaves little room
for Salo to return beyond this season.

 

  

F&F
Sas.

From UBC to the NHL and back again

By Josh Martin, Sports Editor

ast Thursday night, UBC
thunderbird’s starting goaltender

Jordan White’s dream came true
with a taste of what it’s like to play in the
NHL. Well, sort of. He was on the Sharks
bench the whole night and didn’t see the
ice outside of warm-up, but still that’s a
pretty special moment for the 22 year old
to be a part of.

White was called up to play with
the Sharks as an emergency back-up
after Anterro Nittymaki went down
with an injury in the morning practice
skate. A Canucks fan turned San Jose
fan for one game, White signed a one-
game amateur tryout contract earlier in
the afternoon before San Jose beat the
Vancouver Canucks 2-1 in a shootout.
White throughout the game seemed pretty
calm and relaxed and in the shootout was
standing eagerly rooting for his team from
the bench.

Just imagine going from sitting in
your early morning class at school to
getting ready for your practice skate with
the team to getting a phone call from the
San Jose organization that they want you
to be the back-up goaltender for tonight’s

 

game. Now that is unreal. And what

a game to be a part of with both Antii
Niemi and Roberto Luongo standing on
their heads from both ends of the ice.
Something that White will never forget,
that’s for sure.

“The first call in the afternoon and
coming here and seeing how welcoming
all the guys are, and just being able to
go out there and lace ’em up and see the
energy in this building and just be on the
ice is something I really cherished.” White
said

This is the second time a UBC
goaltender has been called up to the big
leagues with the last time it happening to
Chris Levesque in a December 9, 2003
game when Dan Cloutier went down with
an injury and Levesque was called upon to
back-up Johan Hedberg.

The second year university goaltender
has three years of major junior experience
in the WHL and currently holds a 7-7-4
record with a 3.51 GAA and a .876 SV%
so far in the 2010-2011 season with the
Thunderbirds. He didn’t receive any
payment from the game but got to keep his
Sharks jersey and not to mention had the
best seat in the house.

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