First Star Ty Henricks Powers Lumberjacks Win

Ty Henricks (Muskegon Lumberjacks)

The Winter Break is just about totally here with all the New York Rangers college prospects and Rasmus Larsson already on their break and off until December 29th. The remaining prospects in the CHL and USHL have games this weekend before they go on their Winter break.

Kind of feel bad for Ty Henricks of the Muskegon Lumberjacks as I don’t think he wants to go on any break just yet. Against the Chicago Steel, Henricks earned first star honors after he scored twice to lead the Lumberjacks to a 6-2 win.

Thanks to the folks at @USHL we have a clip of Henricks scoring his first goal. The clip owner doesn’t allow for direct views here but the link takes you to the tweet with the goal.

Got to like how Henricks takes the puck to the net instead of settling for an outside shot that a lot of younger players do. Henricks puts his 6’3.5 215 lb. size to work just like we want to see from a power forward. His second goal was again a power forward’s goal, give him the puck in the offensive zone and he takes it to the net.

That gave Henricks a 2-0-2 night on a game-high six shots with a +2 as he improves his season numbers to 9-4-13. Henricks has a signed letter of intent to attend Western Michigan University next year.

Dylan Roobroeck (Oshawa Generals)

Dylan Roobroeck had a primary assist as his Oshawa Generals extended their unbeaten streak to five games (4-0-1) with a 7-3 win over the Mississauga Steelheads in OHL. Roobroeck set up the Generals third goal which gave his team their first lead of the game. The Generals center was 0-1-1 on two shots with a roughing minor and he was 11-15 on his faceoffs.

Roobroeck extends his scoring streak to four games (1-4-5) as he improves his season totals to 7-19-26. He too is going to end his first half on a roll going 4-8-12 in his last 13 games as his Generals are finally out of last place in the OHL’s Central Division.

Maxim Barbashev (Shawinigan Cataractes)

Maxim Barbashev continues his improved play for his Rimouski Oceanic with his sixth goal in 10 games with the team. Sadly it was in a losing effort as the Oceanic lost to the Drummondville
Voltigeurs 6-3 in QMJHL play. Barbashev was 1-0-1 on one shot as he improved his season totals to 6-3-9 with Rimouski to have an overall season total of 8-10-18.

Barbashev still does not have a Rangers entry level contract in his second year and if he has any hope of one then he needs to do more than one shot a game.

And today the QMJHL also announced a name change as they are now known as the QMJHL with the letters standing for the Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League to better reflect the leagues geographic location. They switched out the word “Major” for “Maritimes”.

Did Not Play

Really wish the hockey world in general (meaning all levels and leagues) would stop with this “upper body”, “lower body” as given all the video clips that are out there it is almost impossible not to know what injury a player suffered. If anything the lack of honesty just opens the door for silly speculation which hurts the player rather than protects him as they want to believe.

Having said that Bryce McConnell-Barker missed his second straight game in what is hard not to call a concussion. McConnell-Barker was injured againt the London Knights on December 10th. The captain of the Soo Greyhounds, McConnell-Barker had just scored a goal for his team when he was hit by a cheapshot from London Spitfire Sawyer Boulton.

Boulton was suspended by the OHL for 10 games as a result of what happened. McConnell-Barker was playing good hockey at the time as after a very slow start to his season was up to 12-18-30 in 30 games. He is listed as “day-to-day” and will have the Winter Break to hopefully recover to play in the second half of the season.

JessRubenstein

Covering New York Ranger prospects since 2004, I have covered every Ranger prospect drafted over that time. I was lucky enough to have been trained by former Boston Bruins GM Harry Sinden having completed the NHL GM and Scouting Course taught at Sports Management Worldwide as well as the late EJ McGuire who was the director of the NHL's Central Scouting Bureau and was the former coach of the AHL's Hartford Wolfpack