Gibbons best between pipes
Ian Gibbons, 10, an ice hockey goaltender from Huntington Beach, recently won the Ace Bailey National Skills Competition at the “Squirt Travel” level.
Many NHL teams sponsor regional competitions for both players and goaltenders each season and the winners advance to the national championships.
Gibbons has won the regional competition at the Squirt Travel level for the past two years and advanced again to represent the Anaheim Ducks.
Last year the national championship was held at Boston University, where Gibbons finished fourth.
This year’s national skills competition was held at the Aviator Sports Complex in New York City.
The event opened on Friday with players/goalies represented by Eastern Conference NHL teams competing for first and second places to advance to the championship round. Goaltenders from the Boston Bruins and Philadelphia Flyers advanced on to the championship round.
On Saturday, Gibbons defeated the goaltender representing the Nashville Predators to win the Western Conference division title.
On Sunday, the top two goaltenders from each conference squared off for the championship round.
In the end, Gibbons defeated the goaltender representing the Philadelphia Flyers to win the national skills competition.
Gibbons has been playing hockey since he was 5. He started out playing in-line hockey at Coast2Coast in Huntington Beach, before switching to ice three years ago.
He will begin his third season of ice playing for the Anaheim Wildcats Hockey Club. This past season, the Anaheim Wildcats squirt 98’ team won both the Southern California Amateur Hockey Assn. (SCAHA) and California Amateur Hockey Assn. (CAHA) championships.
Gibbons, who attends Seacliff Elementary, will be traveling soon to St. Petersburg, Russia for 10 days to play with Team USA Select. This team is composed of players from Southern California, Detroit and Minneapolis, Minn.
Some of the teams participating are: Silver Lions (St. Petersburg), Dinamo (Moscow), Metallurg (Magnitogorsk), Finland Select (Finland), Ak Bars (Kazan), HC Gomel (Belarus), Locomotive (Yaroslavl) and Czech Select (Czech Republic).
H.B. Club team wins championship
The Huntington Beach-based Gold Coast Xtreme Elite GU-12 Soccer Club are Xtreme Cup Champions.
The squad went 4-0 over the weekend with 25 goals for and 0 against, including 12 goals from forward Jade Kratovil who posted a double hat trick.
