JACKSON HOLE, WYO – The Jackson Hole Moose are about to see plenty of the Vail Yeti. The local hockey club begins a four-game set with the Colorado pucksters—two at home in the Snow King Sports and Event Center this weekend and two in their barn Nov. 30 and Dec. 1.
The Moose are 2-0 after getting past the Bozeman Stingers to open the season Nov. 2-3. Coach Howie Carruth might be looking to tighten up the defense. The Moose are averaging 6 goals against in the early going for the 2018-19 season.
Jackson and Vail split last year’s four game series, both clubs holding serve on home ice. The Moose beat the Yeti 5-1 and 4-1 almost exactly one year ago at the SEC. Vail returned the favor with 5-3 and 5-2 wins two weeks later at the Dobson Arena.
The Moose are led by Tom Hartnett (24), Drew Akins (7), Kevin Sunde (89), AJ Sanders (61), Eric Steinman (9), and Alex Dewitz (96) on offense. The Moose defense looks much improved on paper with the addition of Dan Dupont and Davis Sebald, but the group struggled to get the puck out of their own zone for long stretches against a hard-forechecking Stinger team.
As a group, the D needs to be sharper as does goaltender Nick Krauss, who GAA so far looks far more mortal than fans know him to be. Scoring does not appear to be a problem at this point. The Moose are getting production from a good mix of forward and nearly every line.
This will be the Yeti’s first games of the 2018-19 season.
Yeti vs Moose, Friday and Saturday, November 16-17. Doors/music at 7pm. Puck drops at 7:30pm.
