2015 CBR Brave season

2015 CBR Brave
League	4th AIHL
2015 record	13–3–2–10
Home record	9–1–1–3
Road record	4–2–1–7
Goals for	125
Goals against	104
Team information
Coach	Brad Hunt Josh Unice (Interim head coach)
Assistant coach	David Rogina Aaron Clayworth
Captain	Mark Rummukainen
Alternate captains	Peter Taylor Aaron Clayworth Jimmy Byers
Arena	Phillip Ice Skating Centre
Team leaders
Goals	Stephen Blunden (28) Kelly Geoffrey
Assists	Stephen Blunden (51)
Points	Stephen Blunden (79)
Penalty minutes	David Dunwoodie (120)
Goals against average	Josh Unice (3.71)
←  2014 season 2016 season  →

The 2015 CBR Brave season was the Brave's 2nd season in the Australian Ice Hockey League since being founded and entering the league in 2014. The season ran from 25 April 2015 to 29 August 2015 for the Brave. CBR finished fourth in the regular season behind the Newcastle North Stars, Melbourne Ice and Perth Thunder. ^[1] The Brave qualified for the AIHL Finals in Melbourne and played in semi-final one. Canberra were defeated by league premiers, the Newcastle North Stars, 3–4 in their semi-final match and were knocked out of the finals weekend, ending their season. ^{[2] [3]}

News

In January 2015, the Brave announced the appointment of Brad Hunt as the new head coach of the team for the 2015 AIHL season. Brad was originally going to take on the assistant coach role for 2015 after hanging up the skates at the end of the 2014 season but with former head coach Matti Louma leaving the club to take on a development coaching position in Perth, Hunt was promoted to head coach instead. ^[4]

In February 2015, the league commission announced scheduling changes for the 2015 season that saw the Sydney Ice Dogs and Sydney Bears move three home matches from Sydney to Canberra. ^[5]

In March 2015, the CBR Brave in conjunction with Ice Hockey ACT announced the formation of the Junior Brave team to compete in the 2015 NSW Midget League. The junior program was coached by former AIHL player and Australian representative Andrew Brunt and finished their first season by finishing second in the league and losing the grand final to defending champions, the Liverpool Saints, 3–1. Three of the Junior Brave players made their debut with the senior CBR Brave team in the AIHL during 2015, including: goalie Alexandre Tetrault and forwards Jayden Lewis and Jordan Brunt. Alexandre Tetrault was also selected to represent Australia in the Under 20 World Championships in Serbia in 2016. ^[6]

In July 2015, the CBR Brave and head coach Brad Hunt parted ways by mutual consent. On ice performances during the first half of the regular season and future planning were cited as the main reasons for the decision. Import goaltender, Josh Unice, was appointed interim head coach for the remainder of the season. Alternative captain, Aaron Clayworth, retired from playing and stepped in to take over as assistant coach for the remainder of the season. ^[7]

Roster

Team roster for the 2015 AIHL season ^[8]

2015 AIHL CBR Brave Roster

#	Nat	Name	Pos	S/G	Age	Acquired	Birthplace
73		Stephen Blunden	W	L	26	2014	Gloucester, Ontario, Canada
92		Jordan Brunt	F	L	15	2015	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
22		Harrison Byers	C	R	22	2014	Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada
17		James Byers	D	R	21	2014	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
6		Aaron Clayworth	D	R	30	2014	Perth, Western Australia, Australia
14		David Dunwoodie	D	R	29	2015	Hamilton, New Zealand
38		Nickolas Eckhardt	G	L	25	2014	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
19		Jordan Gavin	F	R	33	2014	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
39		Kelly Geoffrey	W	L	25	2015	Newmarket, Ontario, Canada
27		Mike Giorgi	D	L	27	2014	Toronto, Ontario, Canada
65		Matthew Harvey	D	R	29	2014	Calgary, Alberta, Canada
3		Ryan Johnson	F	R	41	2014	Amesbury, Massachusetts, United States
16		Tyler Kubara	F	R	20	2015	Wombarra, New South Wales, Australia
77		Tom Letki	F	R	26	2014	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
11		David Lewis	F	L	37	2014	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
93		Jayden Lewis	F	L	17	2015	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
8		Tomas Manco	D	L	27	2015	Brezno, Slovakia
4		Kyle Mariani	D	R	26	2015	Toronto, Ontario, Canada
64		Kai Miettinen	F	L	19	2014	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
24		Ben Pagett	D	0	30	2015	Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
77		Jordan Peddle	C	L	24	2015	Elbow, Saskatchewan, Canada
61		Scott Pitt	C	L	27	2015	Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
32		Alain Riesen	F	L	25	2014	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
12		Mark Rummukainen	D	R	33	2014	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
91		Peter Taylor	F	R	27	2014	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
92		Alex Tetreault	G	L	17	2015	Montreal, Quebec, Canada
69		Aleksi Toivonen	G	L	19	2015	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
30		Josh Unice	G	L	26	2015	Holland, Ohio, United States
29		Stuart Woodall	G	L	32	2014	Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia

Transfers

All the player transfers in and out by the CBR Brave for the 2015 AIHL season.

In

Pos	Player	Transferred From	Local / Import
F	Jordan Brunt	No Team	Local
D	David Dunwoodie	Sydney Ice Dogs	Local
W	Kelly Geoffrey	No Team	Import
F	Tyler Kubara	Sydney Ice Dogs	Local
F	Jayden Lewis	Meaford Knights	Local
D	Tomas Manco	No Team	Local
D	Kyle Mariani	Laval Prédateurs	Import
D	Ben Pagett	No Team	Local
C	Jordan Peddle	Mississippi Surge	Import
C	Scott Pitt	Braehead Clan	Import
G	Alexandre Tetreault	No Team	Local
G	Aleksi Toivonen	HCIK	Local
G	Josh Unice	Sheffield Steelers	Import

Out

Pos	Player	Transferred To	Local / Import
D	David Bell	No Team	Local
F	Darren Cope	No Team	Local
F	Jeff Harvey	No Team	Import
G	Brad Hunt	CBR Brave head coach	Local
C	Anton Kokkonen	TuTo	Import
F	Matthew Lehoczky	No Team	Local
F	Christopher McPhail	No Team	Local
W	Mathieu Ouellette	No Team	Import
G	Petri Pitkänen	KeuPa HT	Import
F	Shai Rabinowitz	No Team	Local
D	Darren Taylor	No Team	Local
F	Derek Walker	No Team	Import
F	Corey Wilkie	Ste. Anne Aces	Import

Staff

Staff Roster for 2015 AIHL season ^[9]

2015 AIHL CBR Brave Staff

Role	Staff
Head coach	Josh Unice Brad Hunt
Assistant coach	David Rogina
Assistant coach	Aaron Clayworth
Physiotherapist	Carolyn Smith
Equipment manager	Adrian Miller
Bench official	Darren Sault
Bench official	Kelly Sault

Standings

Regular season

Summary

Season	Overall										Home								Away
	P	W	L	OW	OL	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Finish	P	W	L	OW	OL	GF	GA	GD	P	W	L	OW	OL	GF	GA	GD
2015	28	13	10	3	2	125	104	+21	47	4th	14	9	3	1	1	62	45	+17	14	4	7	2	1	63	59	+4

Position by round

Round	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18
Position	5	4	5	5	5	4	3	5	6	6	6	6	4	4	4	4	4	4

Updated to match(es) played on Completed. Source: www.icehockeynewsaustralia.com

League table

Team	GP	W	SOW	SOL	L	GF	GA	GDF	PTS
Newcastle North Stars	28	19	1	4	4	152	83	+69	63
Melbourne Ice	28	15	5	1	7	121	83	+38	56
Perth Thunder	28	14	1	4	9	103	93	+10	48
CBR Brave	28	13	3	2	10	125	104	+21	47
Adelaide Adrenaline	28	11	3	3	11	109	111	−2	42
Melbourne Mustangs	28	11	3	2	12	139	105	+34	41
Sydney Bears	28	11	1	2	14	110	110	0	37
Sydney Ice Dogs	28	0	1	0	27	39	209	−170	01

Qualified for the Goodall Cup playoffs

H Newman Reid Trophy winners

¹The Ice Dogs were fined three competition points for multiple breaches by-law 4 which requires teams to travel with at least 15 players unless an exemption has been granted. ^[10]

Source

Finals

Summary

Season	Finals weekend
	P	W	L	GF	GA	Result	Semi-final	Goodall Cup final
2015	1	0	1	3	4	Semi-finalists	Lost 3-4 (North Stars)

Bracket

	Semifinals					Final
	1	Newcastle North Stars	4
	4	CBR Brave	3
						Newcastle North Stars		3
						Melbourne Ice		2
	3	Perth Thunder	0
	2	Melbourne Ice	1

Schedule & results

Regular season

Matchday	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	22	23	24	25	26	27	28
Arena	H	A	H	A	A	H	H	H	A	H	H	H	A	A	A	H	H	A	A	A	A	H	A	A	H	H	H	A
Result	W	L	W	L	L	W	L	W	W	W	L	W	L	L	L	W	L	L	W	L	W	W	W	W	L	W	W	W

Updated to match(es) played on Completed. Source: AIHL
A = Away; H = Home; W = Win; L = Loss

2015 fixtures and results
Date	Time	Away	Score	Home	Location	Recap
25 April	17:30	Sydney Bears	2–4	CBR Brave	Canberra
26 April	17:00	CBR Brave	4–7	Newcastle North Stars	Newcastle
2 May	17:30	Adelaide Adrenaline	3–5	CBR Brave	Canberra
9 May	16:30	CBR Brave	3–4	Perth Thunder	Perth
10 May	16:30	CBR Brave	1–4	Perth Thunder	Perth
16 May	17:30	Melbourne Mustangs	4–5	CBR Brave	Canberra
17 May	17:00	Melbourne Mustangs	4 – 3 (SO)	CBR Brave	Canberra
23 May	17:30	Adelaide Adrenaline	2–8	CBR Brave	Canberra
24 May	17:00	CBR Brave	5 – 4 (SO)	Newcastle North Stars	Newcastle
30 May	17:30	Melbourne Ice	1–3	CBR Brave	Canberra
31 May	17:00	Melbourne Ice	4–2	CBR Brave	Canberra
6 June	17:30	Sydney Ice Dogs	1–4	CBR Brave	Canberra
13 June	17:00	CBR Brave	1–3	Melbourne Ice	Melbourne
14 June	16:00	CBR Brave	2–3	Melbourne Ice	Melbourne
20 June	17:00	CBR Brave	3–4	Sydney Bears	Canberra
27 June	17:30	Sydney Ice Dogs	4–6	CBR Brave	Canberra
28 June	17:30	Newcastle North Stars	5–1	CBR Brave	Canberra
4 July	17:00	CBR Brave	2 – 3 (SO)	Melbourne Mustangs	Melbourne
5 July	16:00	CBR Brave	5–4	Melbourne Mustangs	Melbourne
11 July	16:30	CBR Brave	7–11	Adelaide Adrenaline	Adelaide
12 July	15:30	CBR Brave	6 – 5 (SO)	Adelaide Adrenaline	Adelaide
18 July	17:00	Sydney Bears	3–6	CBR Brave	Canberra
25 July	17:30	CBR Brave	7–3	Sydney Bears	Penrith
1 August	17:00	CBR Brave	10–2	Sydney Ice Dogs	Canberra
8 August	17:30	Perth Thunder	4–3	CBR Brave	Canberra
9 August	17:00	Perth Thunder	3–6	CBR Brave	Canberra
15 August	17:30	Newcastle North Stars	5 – 6 (SO)	CBR Brave	Canberra
22 August	17:00	CBR Brave	7–2	Sydney Ice Dogs	Canberra

Finals

Goodall Cup semi-finalAll times are UTC+10:00

29 August 2015 15:00

CBR Brave

3–4 (2–0, 1–1, 0–3)

Newcastle North Stars

Melbourne Icehouse Attendance: 1200

Game reference
	Aleksi Toivonen	Goalies	Dayne Davis	Referee: Cory Ross Linesmen: Casper Russell-Huber Fraser Ohlson
	Geoffrey (SH) (Mariani, Blunden) – 1:08 1 – 0 Blunden (SH) (Geoffrey, Rummukainen) – 7:14 2 – 0 Blunden (Peddle, Geoffrey) – 18:59 3 – 0 3 – 1 22:47 – Malloy (PP) (Wudrick) 3 – 2 38:45 – Wudrick (Starke) 3 – 3 44:09 – Wudrick 3 – 4 48:49 – Wudrick
	47 min	Penalties	18 min
	20	Shots	38

Player statistics

Skaters

Regular season Nat Player Pos M G A P PIM Stephen Blunden D 24 28 51 79 46 Jordan Brunt F 1 0 0 0 0 Harrison Byers D 25 4 2 6 102 James Byers F 26 1 9 10 10 Aaron Clayworth F 17 0 1 1 10 David Dunwoodie F 20 4 18 22 120 Jordan Gavin D 21 5 2 7 18 Kelly Geoffrey D 21 28 33 61 40 Mike Giorgi F 2 0 1 1 2 Matthew Harvey F 11 7 5 12 2 Ryan Johnson F 24 3 4 7 55 Tyler Kubara D 27 5 10 15 4 Tom Letki F 2 0 0 0 0 David Lewis F 23 1 1 2 2 Jayden Lewis F 1 0 1 1 0 Tomas Manco F 23 0 6 6 20 Kyle Mariani F 24 10 18 28 46 Kai Miettinen F 28 2 4 6 38 Ben Pagett F 5 0 0 0 2 Jordan Peddle D 7 2 8 10 24 Scott Pitt F 19 18 24 42 18 Alain Riesen F 17 0 2 2 8 Mark Rummukainen D 26 3 10 13 49 Peter Taylor D 24 1 2 3 18

Finals Nat Player Pos M G A P PIM Stephen Blunden D 1 2 1 3 25 Jordan Brunt F 0 0 0 0 0 Harrison Byers D 0 0 0 0 0 James Byers F 1 0 0 0 0 Aaron Clayworth F 0 0 0 0 0 David Dunwoodie F 1 0 0 0 4 Jordan Gavin D 1 0 0 0 0 Kelly Geoffrey D 1 1 2 3 0 Mike Giorgi F 0 0 0 0 0 Matthew Harvey F 1 0 0 0 0 Ryan Johnson F 0 0 0 0 0 Tyler Kubara D 0 0 0 0 0 Tom Letki F 0 0 0 0 0 David Lewis F 1 0 0 0 0 Jayden Lewis F 0 0 0 0 0 Tomas Manco F 1 0 0 0 0 Kyle Mariani F 1 0 1 1 16 Kai Miettinen F 1 0 0 0 0 Ben Pagett F 0 0 0 0 0 Jordan Peddle D 1 0 1 1 2 Scott Pitt F 0 0 0 0 0 Alain Riesen F 1 0 0 0 0 Mark Rummukainen D 1 0 1 1 0 Peter Taylor D 0 0 0 0 0

Goaltenders

Regular season Nat Player Pos M SO MP GA GAA SA SV SV% G A PIM Nickolas Eckhardt G 0 - - - - - - - - - - Alex Tetreault G 1 0 50 2 2.40 20 18 0.900 0 0 0 Aleksi Toivonen G 10 0 463 36 4.66 311 275 0.884 0 1 0 Josh Unice G 14 0 679 42 3.71 533 491 0.921 0 1 2 Stuart Woodall G 6 0 198 19 5.76 120 101 0.842 0 0 0

Finals Nat Player Pos M SO MP GA GAA SA SV SV% G A PIM Nickolas Eckhardt G - - - - - - - - - - - Alex Tetreault G - - - - - - - - - - - Aleksi Toivonen G 1 0 49 4 4.88 38 34 0.895 0 0 0 Josh Unice G - - - - - - - - - - - Stuart Woodall G - - - - - - - - - - -

Awards

Team awards for 2015 season [11] 2015 Brave awards Award Recipient Bravest of the Brave Stephen Blunden Best Forward Stephen Blunden Best Defenceman Kyle Mariani Fans Choice Jimmy Byers Player's Choice Mark Rummukainen Coach's Award Kai Miettinen Peter Taylor Emerging Brave Jimmy Byers John Lewis Memorial Award Ryan Johnson

AIHL awards for 2015 season [12] 2015 AIHL awards Award Recipient * No Brave players won any AIHL Awards in 2015

References

1. "2015 AIHL season: Round 18". icehockeynewsaustralia.com. August 21, 2015. Retrieved January 5, 2020.
2. "CBR Brave vs Newcastle North Stars - 2015 Semi-Final". theaihl.com. August 29, 2015. Retrieved January 5, 2021.
3. Gibson, Bianca (August 29, 2015). "North Stars edge Brave in instant classic". theaihl.com. Retrieved January 5, 2021.
4. Gaskin, Lee (February 5, 2015). "New Canberra Brave coach Brad Hunt aims to improve on fairytale season in Australian Ice Hockey League". The Canberra Times . Retrieved April 14, 2015.
5. "Schedule changes for the Bears and Ice Dogs". Ice Hockey News Australia. February 10, 2015. Archived from the original on February 10, 2015. Retrieved February 10, 2015.
6. "Junior Brave to play in NSW Midget League". icehockeynewsaustralia.com. March 31, 2015. Retrieved April 14, 2015.
7. "Brave Move: Unice appointed interim Head Coach for remainder of 2015 season". CBR Brave ltd. Archived from the original on July 14, 2015. Retrieved July 14, 2015.
8. "2015 CBR Brave Team Roster". Elite Prospects. Retrieved January 5, 2020.
9. "CBR Brave Coaching Staff". www.theaihl.com. Retrieved April 25, 2016.
10. "Ice Dogs docked points for by-law breach". Australian Ice Hockey League. July 28, 2015. Archived from the original on March 14, 2016. Retrieved August 2, 2015.
11. Gaskin, Lee (August 23, 2015). "Canberra Brave forward Stephen Blunden named most valuable player after outstanding season". The Canberra Times . Retrieved January 5, 2021.
12. "2015 AIHL Award Winners". Australian Ice Hockey League. September 1, 2015. Retrieved January 5, 2021.