John Paerels has been both a driving force and steadfast friend to scholastic inline hockey in Southern California for the better part of the last decade.

Though he has retired from his responsibilities as league coordinator with the Anaheim Ducks Inline Scholastic League (ADISL), the largest league of its kind in the region, he will continue coaching Cal Poly Pomona’s inline hockey club team in the Western Collegiate Roller Hockey League (WCRHL) and still facilitate the California Scholastic Roller Hockey (CASRH) Facebook page he founded.

It’s reassuring to know that he will remain connected to the sport he obviously loves nurturing.

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“I’ve been involved with the league in one capacity or another since 2010, and it’s been a lot of fun watching players develop and getting to see a lot of exciting hockey,” Paerels said of his time spent with the ADISL. “I’ve met some great people over that time that I hope to see again in the future.”

The National Collegiate Roller Hockey Association (NCRHA) formally recognized Paerels’s dedication to scholastic inline hockey by presenting him with the Outstanding Contribution to Collegiate Roller Hockey Award at April’s National Collegiate Roller Hockey Championship in Rochester, N.Y.

The award honors a player, coach, staff member or other contributor from each NCRHA conference who best exemplify leadership qualities on and off the rink and have made a noteworthy contribution to the advancement of collegiate roller hockey.

Paerels’s contribution to scholastic inline hockey has been exhaustive. He has both literally and figuratively driven to the last mile in promoting the sport.

Besides assisting in completing all the paper work needed to get official recognition from the university to return the Broncos to active membership in the NCRHA, Paerels also has served as van driver and made lodging arrangements for any long road trips the team has embarked on, such as those to San Jose, Chico, Tucson, Phoenix and Minneapolis to Fargo (and back in a blizzard).

“I try to promote collegiate roller hockey whenever the opportunity presents itself, either via my scholastic roller hockey Facebook page or at the local rinks,” he explained. “My interest in forming collegiate hockey clubs goes all the way back to starting ice teams at LA Harbor College in 1982 and Springfield College (Mass.) in 1988.”

Cal Poly Pomona advanced to the Division III semifinals at April’s national championship tournament to set a new standard for the program since it returned to active status four years ago.

The Broncos finished the season 21-6 overall, including a runner-up finish to Cal Berkeley in March’s WCRHL regional championship tournament.

Pomona played six games at this year’s NCRHA tournament, finishing 3-3 after recording playoff victories against James Madison University (10-1 in the Round of 16) and Temple University (7-1 in the quarterfinals). The Broncos ended their run at nationals with a 10-2 loss to eventual national champion Endicott College.

Pomona’s semifinals finish did not go unrecognized in postseason awards as Ian Duffy earned second team all-tournament honors and both Jacob Oberschelp and Derick Rosas were tabbed as honorable mentions.

Rosas collected some amazing numbers during the season, including 51 goals and 92 points in 27 games to lead all WCRHL Division III scorers. Duffy ranked second in team scoring with 45 points.

“The team from Endicott College included a former Division I college ice player and was ridiculously strong, but overall it was a very good year for us, a very successful season,” Paerels noted. “We’ve progressed from simply having a team in our first year to making regionals in our second year to making nationals in our third year to making the national semifinals in our fourth year. With most players returning we’re looking forward to another strong year in 2019-20.”

Paerels plans to devote more time to the collegiate program.

“Since I won’t be spending so much time on ADISL matters, I plan on spending more time next year contacting and recruiting prospective students for future seasons,” he said.

It might be an understatement to say that the ADISL’s spring season, which closed with championship playoffs May 17-19 in Irvine, was extremely competitive.

Division champions included Beckman A (Division 1), Laguna Hills (Division 2), Damien B (Division 3.1), Beckman B (Division 3.2), Cypress (Division 4.1) and Mater Dei (Division 4.2).

Beckman A and Laguna Hills both finished with 10-2 final records.

“Although not everyone got the results they were hoping for, overall it was a very exciting night with an eight-round shootout, an overtime championship and a comeback win from a six-goal third period deficit,” Paerels recounted. “We had 18 playoff games decided by an average of 1.27 goals per game, six games won by lower seeded teams, four championships decided by a single goal and another by two goals while 12 teams took home some level of hardware.”

Paerels has helped provide an invaluable information platform for the scholastic inline leagues operating in the state through his comprehensive Facebook page (@cahsrollerhockey). It’s been both a labor of love and simply a labor at times.

“It’s definitely been a challenge,” Paerels admitted. “I’m not sure that it’s really a matter of what I ‘enjoy’ as much of a sense that somebody needs to get information out on the various leagues. “Prior to starting the CASRH Facebook page, there wasn’t a central info source for all of the scholastic leagues, including seasons and contact information.”

Spring fever

Twenty-four teams participated in the ADISL’s spring high school season, with playoff champions determined in six sub-divisions.

Beckman A (pictured above) defeated Edison A 4-3 in the Division 1 championship game on the strength of a pair of third-period goals by Christian Huynh and Brayden Fleming.

Meanwhile, Laguna Hills out-pointed Damien A by a score of 11-10 in one of the most entertaining games of the spring finals.

Damien scored six goals in the second period to lead 9-4 before Laguna Hills rallied with six unanswered goals in the third period to post the wild comeback victory. Tyler Shetland paced Laguna Hills with four goals and four assists while teammate Anthony Oviedo added four goals and three assists.

In other finals, Damien B edged Woodbridge 5-4 to claim the Division 3.1 title while Beckman B defeated Bishop 6-4 to win in the Division 3.2 final.

Sawyer Pomeroy scored the game-winning goal to lift Cypress to a 5-4 overtime win over Crossroads Christian in the Division 4.1 championship game while Nicholas Smith (four goals, one assist) was the high point scorer in Mater Dei’s 7-3 win over Edison B in the Division 4.2 title game.

Shetland established himself as the preeminent scorer during the season with 61 points on 42 goals and 19 assists. Oviedo (26 goals, 10 assists) and Crossroad Christian’s Ty Murchison (20 goals, 16 assists) tied for runner-up honors with 36 points apiece.

Woodbridge’s Charlie Kennedy (25 goals, seven assists) and Damien B’s Matt Augustine (18 goals, 13 assists) followed with 32 and 31 points, respectively, while Crossroads Christian’s Cade MacRitchie (24 goals, five assists) and Mission Viejo’s Ben Wallace (18 goals, 11 assists) tied with 29 points.

Three other players scored more than 20 goals during the season: Smith (22 goals), Fleming (21 goals) and Orange Lutheran’s Aiden Hansen (21 goals).

Danny Tasigeorges (Beckman A) and Louie Garcia (Damien B) both posted 8-2-1 goaltending records for their respective teams. Garcia did double duty with a 7-5-0 record while tending the net for Damien A.

Junior achievement

The ADISL’s Junior High Division playoffs took place June 14 at Irvine Inline to wrap up Paerels’s involvement with the league.

Hewes Middle School (pictured above) ended the 2018-19 scholastic season on a high note by recording upset victories against higher-seeded opponents in its two playoff games to emerge as spring league champions.

Teams played 10 regular-season games, with the top four teams advancing to the semifinals.

Hewes, seeded fourth, upset top-seeded Lakeside Middle School 11-3 in the semifinals before topping second-seeded Rancho Santa Margarita Intermediate School 11-1 in the championship game.

Trevor Connelly paced Hewes in the two playoff games with 13 goals and 17 points. He faced off the playoffs with a bang by racking up nine goals and 11 points in the semifinals and tacked on four goals and six points in the final.

“We’ve always allowed players to get credit for games played if they were out injured, and Hewes had a AAA ice player who had missed most of the season due to a broken wrist but showed up for playoffs and proceeded to single-handedly roll through the other two teams,” Paerels explained.

Hewes teammate Aiden Hannegan recorded a hat trick in the championship game while Brendan Bosca scored two goals in each of the two playoff games.

Lakeside had finished regular season play 8-1-1 while Rancho Santa Margarita earned the No. 2 playoff seed after finishing regular season play 7-2-0-1. Jeffrey Trail finished regular season play 5-5, followed by Hewes at 4-5-1. Isaac Sowers Middle School finished regular season play 1-9 and did not qualify for the playoffs.

RSM defeated third-seeded Jeffrey Trail 7-5 in the semifinals behind five points (four goals, one assist) from Nick Woods.

Lakeside’s Tyler McGowan paced all division scorers with 29 points (21 goals, eight assists) in 10 games, followed by RSM’s Max Meltzer with 24 points (16 goals, eight assists) in 11 games. RSM’s Marcus Kammerer (17 goals, four assists) and Hewes’ Jack Riley (16 goals, five assists) both finished the season with 21 points.

RSM’s Pete Gonzalez led all division goaltenders with eight wins. Jeffrey Trail’s Luke Weir followed with five wins.

Photos/ADISL

— Phillip Brents

(July 31, 2019)