Black Hawks Preview for Dec 4-5 Games

The Waterloo Black Hawks prepare for yet another road trip.  This week, the Hawks play two in Fargo, ND on December 4-5, 2014.

Northwest Passage:
Fargo is geographically the end of the line in the USHL, and that’s where the Black Hawks are headed for games on Thursday and Friday. Although this is a chilly time of year in North Dakota, temperatures in the teens and twenties during the trip won’t be much different than the weather in Waterloo. Prior to this week’s action, 11 of 19 Black Hawks games have been on the road, tying Waterloo for second most away contests in the USHL currently, behind only the Green Bay Gamblers. The two tilts in Fargo will represent the Hawks’ final visit to Scheels Arena this season. On October 24th, Waterloo fell there in a shootout, 3-2.

Preliminary Pick:
Former Waterloo defenseman Ian McCoshen is on the preliminary Team USA roster for the 2015 World Junior Championship in Montreal and Toronto, USA Hockey announced Tuesday. McCoshen and the 29 other players chosen with him will participate in a training camp later this month, with the final round of winnowing taking place by Christmas Eve. The Boston College sophomore appeared in five games during the 2014 World Junior Championships as the United States finished fifth.

Recent Arrivals All Score:
The Black Hawks acquired Ruslan Rakhmatov, Semyon Krasheninnikov, and Ethan Spaxman last month, and each has now scored a goal. Rakhmatov found the net in his debut at Dubuque on November 14th. Krasheninnikov pushed an opportunity over the goal line when the Black Hawks visited the Omaha Lancers last Wednesday. Spaxman contributed a goal against the RoughRiders in Cedar Rapids Saturday. Sixteen players have now scored at least once for Waterloo in 2014/15.

Notes From November:
The Hawks begin a new month after a tough November. Waterloo was outscored 53-26 over ten November games. Brandon Montour and Brock Boeser led the Hawks offensively in November with 11 points apiece. Boeser paced the club with nine assists, while Tyler Sheehy had a team-best five goals. Waterloo’s scoring was split evenly between even-strength and special teams: the Hawks converted a dozen power plays and tallied one shorthanded goal, with the other 13 scores coming five-on-five.

Weekly Recap:
In spite of two goals by Brandon Montour, the Hawks could not overcome a six-goal Omaha Lancers first period last Wednesday, falling 10-4. Niko Hildenbrand notched the only Waterloo goal on Thursday as the Cedar Rapids RoughRiders claimed a 4-1 decision. In a Saturday rematch, the RoughRiders came out on top 5-2, with a pair of empty net goals stretching the margin.