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3.15.04
Tri-Cities Wins 5-2, As...
RALLY FALLS SHORT - SEASON IS OVER FOR THE
AA LAS VEGAS REBELS MIDGET MAJORS
By Lee Samuels
Photos by Rich Samuels
Las Vegas - When it was over, defenseman Jeff Root took off his black helmet and sat all alone on the Rebels bench. Conrad Trimbath
gathered up his golden sticks for the last time. Coach Rob Pallin stood at the rail, emptying the water out of soft plastic water bottles onto the ice.
Last games are tough games...
And this was a real tough one.
Down 4-0 after two periods, the AA Rebels mounted an intense,
fiery rally and scored two goals to get within two.
The big rink was rocking, shakers were shaking, the little ones were going up and down the steps in the bleachers and it looked
like panic was setting onto the Tri-Cities midget major team.
The Rebels made a huge rush, there was a pile of skaters at the Tri-Cities net and all of sudden Rebels sticks and arms went up in the air.
Goal, Rebels, with 1:01 to play.
The place was on fire....
Except, the goal never made it onto the Pepsi scoreboard high above the rink.
Although the Rebels thought they scored, the goal was waved off.
Ouch, that one hurt and there was a firestorm of protesting on the ice.
Eventually, play was restored and the Tri-Cities popped in an empty-goal to win the game, 5-2, and move into the championship
game here this afternoon at 3:00 pm.
For the Rebels, the loss was the end of the season.
The Rebels skated extremely well at the regionals, winning their first three games which included a mighty
effort in a 4-3 win over the Paramount Panthers.
In this game, Tri-Cities scored first on a 5-on-3 with 12:08 in the first.
They opened the second period with another power play goal to make it 2-0 at 14:56.
Then, a key play.
At the high slot, Las Vegas' Max Maleev fired in a shot which appeared to hit the inside of the left red post, go into the net and come right back out.
However, after a brief timeout by officials who huddled near the scorers' area, it was ruled no goal.
Tri-Cities then scored two more and going into the third led by 4-0.
Then, all heck broke loose.
At the start of the third period, Anthony Greener scored to make it 4-1 with 14:01 left.
Then, Aaron Baca passed to defenseman Ryan Krametbauer and his mid-range shot went through a thicket of
skaters and went into the net, the puck rattling around the lower part of it.
There was 12:40 left and it was a 4-2 game.
Las Vegas had a power play with 11:43 to go and Pallin sent out his top guns in Greener, Trimbath, Kurt Long, Maleev and Sammy Micco.
Right near the end of the power play, Trimbath was behind the Tri-Cities net. He fired a pass to Greener who tried to place the puck in the upper left corner but the shot went wide left.
On the next Las Vegas power play, with 6:37 to go, Pallin tried a combination of Greener, Trimbath, Maleev, Jason Allen and Micco.
Allen, from the right side, actually put the puck in the net but it was pretty obvious a whistle had been blown a second earlier.
So, no goal.
As time wound down, Las Vegas mounted one last rally.
As photographs of the play showed, Micco was down in the crease area, Baca was on the left side and Trimbath was in the slot when the Rebels on the ice thought they scored with 1:01 to play.
There was a brief celebration, which turned to frustration when the goal was disallowed.
From that moment, down 2 goals with a minute left, the Rebels were simply out of time.
About an hour later, Pallin looked at photographs of the play with 1:01 left. He spoke quietly to parents and to his skaters as they left the big rink.
He looked to the rink and the scoreboard still had the final score burned in red lights - 2 to 5.
Final Score
AA TRI-CITY WASHINGTON.....1....3....1....=5
AA LAS VEGAS REBELS...........0....0....2....=2
LV-Anthony Greener
LV-Ryan Krametbauer (Aaron Baca)
LV goalies
Brandon Rial, Chris Gahan
3.9.04
Pacific District Championships: Tier II, 17u
Santa Fe Stations Ice Arena, March 11-14
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Game One: Thursday, vs. Paramount Panthers, 8:30 am
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IT'S THE MOMENT OF TRUTH FOR THE REBELS 'D' MEN
By Lee Samuels
Photos by Rich Samuels
Las Vegas - On Thursday morning AA Las Vegas will hit the ice against the Paramount Panthers and it'll take maybe three minutes for the furnace to be turned on real high.
Maybe four minutes, maybe five - but the charcoal is going to be lit and get cherry-red hot real quick.
That's when Rebels ice coach Rob Pallin will stand on the bench,
look down the sheet of ice and search for the eye of the hurricane.
Rebels defenseman Jason Allen, who began the season with the AAA L.A. Jr Kings midget majors, will be in charge of
quarterbacking the Rebs' breakout plays.
He will get the puck, skate behind his own net, stop, spray some ice, size up enemy attackers, look left, look right and blast a pass to a Rebels winger on the boards.
Or, maybe he will skate with the puck and head down ice.
Or, maybe dump a pass to his defenseman.
"He's tremendously skilled, a very good skater, makes good
decisions," said Pallin, who is counting on Allen to get the puck out of the Rebels zone. "He has an edge to his game, which I like to see in a skater."
Allen has been taking the puck out of attack zones for years. He first played 'D' at the age of 12, when he skated for a Doc Johnson-coached Mustangs PeeWee team.
There are six Rebels defensemen ready for the regionals and each has a distinct role. Pallin usually doesn't announce defensemen combinations because he typically uses a rotating system.
However, Allen will skate with either Sammy Micco or Ryan Bowman. Jeff Root, an extremely hard hard hitter, will likely work with Ryan Krametbauer. That leaves the vastly improved Danny Kaminski who has not only
played well defensively but has been averaging about a point a game in his last six starts.
Like most ice coaches, Pallin's #1 goal for his defense is keep the puck out of their zone.
Get the puck out and the Rebels blast onto offense.
There is a Rebels team goal to keep shots under 20 a game, putting much less stress on goalies Brandon Rial and Chris Gahan.
Pallin also likes his defensemen to move attackers to outside lanes.
Root relishes the thought of a tricky forward trying a fancy move to get past. Several times each game, Root
sends those forwards thundered against the wood boards.
Krametbauer is a really wicked defenseman, who uses whatever necessary to stop an attack; Bowman's best
weapon is a super-quick outlet pass to get the offense cooking, while Micco has the power and skating ability to make a sudden rush over the blue line and into a scoring area.
It's a solid, hard-working corps which will be counted on, particularly as the tournament progresses and games get real nasty at the finish.
Historically, in regional tournaments like this, there are plenty of hard-skating, sniper-like scorers. But the winning and the losing comes down to defense and the play in the net.
NEXT: SIZING UP THE FIELD - WHO THE REBS MUST BEAT
3.8.04
STANLEY CUP MAKES VEGAS STOPOVER!
The NHL's Holy Grail Stops Tourists in Their Tracks at the Fremont Street Experience!
Story & Photos by: Rich Samuels
The National Hockey League's Stanley Cup, the cup that anyone that has ever picked up a stick dreams to someday have their name engraved upon, visited Las Vegas today on a
North American tour promoting the upcoming NHL Stanley Cup playoffs in April. Hundreds of diehard hockey fans, Las Vegas residents, tourists and some leftover NASCAR fans from this past weekends Nextel Cup race at the
Las Vegas Motor Speedway were in awe at the beauty of the Cup as it stood on it's blue pedestal at the Fremont Street Experience in downtown Las Vegas Monday. Fans lined up for over two hours to have the opportunity to
get their picture taken with the Cup.
Members of Las Vegas' ECHL hockey team, the Las Vegas Wranglers, were also on hand to sign autographs for fans. But the main attraction was the huge silver Cup, glistening
mirror-like in the beautiful Spring sunshine, backdropped by the world famous Fremont Street Experience.
A Southwest Airlines 'Cup Chauffeur' informed VegasHockey.com that the Cup will
be escorted over to McCarren International Airport this evening under high security for a private viewing by airport employees, and then will continue on its cross-country trek with a scheduled stopover in San Diego,
California Tuesday.
There is no greater accomplishment in your hockey career then to have your name engraved upon the Stanley Cup. Winners of
the Cup get their name engraved upon one of its 5 bottom bands. The top band is removed and placed in the NHL Hall of Fame after the bottom band is filled up and moved up one level. Winners are guaranteed to have
their name upon the Cup for at least 57 years before their band is removed.
A Cup spokesman said this was the first time the Cup had ever been on public display in Las Vegas.
CLICK HERE TO VIEW ADDITIONAL PHOTOS OF THE CUP IN LAS VEGAS!
3.8.04
Pacific District Championships: Tier II, 17u
Santa Fe Stations Ice Arena, March 11-14
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Game One: Thursday, vs. Paramount Panthers, 8:30 am
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FOR SURE, AA LAS VEGAS REBELS HAVE THE RIGHT KIND OF FIREPOWER..
By Lee Samuels
Photos by Rich Samuels
Las Vegas - When the Rebels top line is clicking, it is artistry on ice. Back in September, Rob Pallin's AA Las Vegas Rebels put together some of the all-time, all-heart efforts to go a club-record 13-0-2 to open the season.
That's going unbeaten 15 straight.
For two months.
Since, the 27-18-9 Rebels have rollercoastered up and down. They had some key starters banged up, but before the Dec. 31 roster
lockdown date the Rebels added Max Maleev (AAA San Diego Jr. Gulls), Jason Allen (AAA L.A. Jr Kings) and Aaron Baca (AAA Littleton Hawks).
That's a lot of talent thrown into the mix and for the most part, as
the Rebels approach the Thursday opener vs. Paramount, they are coming in pretty healthy.
Pallin, in his fourth season here, knows that Ron White's 52-11-4 Long Beach Jr. Ice Dogs midget majors are the best in the six
-team field. Pallin also knows that the Paramount Panthers are probably the second best.
But best teams with best records don't always win a regional title. This past weekend in Texas, AAA Team Colorado twice beat 52
-game winner AAA Pikes Peak Miners midget majors to win the gold in the Rocky Mountain region.
And Team Colorado went into that tournament with 22 losses.
Pallin, before the Rebels take the ice on Thursday, will remind his skaters the grit it takes to win on the regional level - get over the wall, skate hard, win puck battles, be unselfish.
There are a lot of brush-fires on the ice, corner wars and there are always problems to resolve. Yet Pallin, in his fourth regional tournament, knows he has enough talent to get the Rebels advanced into the Final Four this
coming weekend.
Which means, the Rebels will have to go 3-0-0 or, at the least, 2-1-0, to advance.
Pallin has always had a top, fiery productive line. His first Las Vegas team three years ago included the 'Triple
Threat Line' of Travis Roseberry, J.C. Caron and Spike Neely which scored 93 goals during the regular season.
This year Pallin has some skaters who put the puck into the net - Maleev (33/33), Anthony Greener (32/34)
and Kurt Long (33/32) - will be counted on to score the key goals beginning on Thursday.
Maleev, who skated for the Moscow Wings 86s in Leningrad last winter, is a heavily recruited skater. Greener
is extremely rough and physical around an attack net and Long likes to power in the way Josh Jasek did it here two years ago.
A key element will be Conrad Trimbath, a playmaker who sees the ice extremely well, is unselfish, and can set up his big scorers.
Anthony Marinello is a tremendously exciting, fast skater who can go coast-to-coast with the puck; Billy Policano is exceptionally strong particuarly in the slot area; Baca is fiery inside the blue line while heading in
and Nick Jackson plays hard and has already been named 'All Heart.'
A plus will be production from a skillful Stringfellow Swan who could put it all together for this big tournament.
NEXT - A LOOK AT THE REBELS DEFENSE
3.5.04
LAS VEGAS REBELS TEAM PHOTOS NOW AVAILABLE
Team photos of the 2003-04 Las Vegas Rebels AA Midget-Major Hockey Club have been uploaded into a special album for viewing and purchasing at the following location:
www.shutterfly.com/pro/samuels/rebels
Photographer Rich Samuels will be available for photo shoots of any ice or roller hockey teams that did not have the opportunity to have a
team photo taken this season. Rich's contact information can be found on his web site at: www.richsamuels.net or simply call him directly at (702) 491-6058.
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