February 16

Saturday night hockey at the Sovereign Center as the Royals hosted the Elmira Jackals for the third game of the week's miniseries. This was the annual "Pink In The Rink" game for breast cancer awareness, it was started some years ago and is always well-received. Jenny's mother Helen is a survivor so it's a cause very dear to her for the obvious reasons. After starting the season 1-5-1 in October the Royals played at a 22-2-1 clip for the rest of the calendar year, thus far in 2013 the club's mark is 10-7-4 (pedestrian by comparison but that November-December pace would be impossible for any team to sustain). The boys lost to Elmira at home on Wednesday and on the road on Friday, on this night in Reading they got back on the winning side with a rugged 4-3 verdict. Ian O'Connor scored twice for the Royals, Yannick Tifu and Stanislav Galiev (the game-winner) added single tallies. Sergey Kostenko picked up the win in goal after taking the loss on Friday. Between injuries and ineffectiveness Kostenko has been #3 on the depth chart most of the season, with Drew MacIntyre currently in the AHL and Brandon Anderson nursing an injury of his own Kostenko was the main man on this night and he acquitted himself well. The win improves the Royals' record to 34-14-6 (21-5-1 at home), the boys are off until Thursday the 21st when the Kalamazoo Wings visit. The next major event on the calendar comes on Wednesday the 20th, McCaskey opens district tournament play at home against Central Dauphin. CD went 9-13 during the regular year and won a qualifying game to make the field, as the #2 seed in the tournament JPM should be the favorite but history is littered with first-round upsets so nothing is for sure. If we win the second round is on the 23rd in Hershey but we have to get there first. Take care, thanks for reading.