NOJHL: By the Numbers

SUDBURY, Ont. – The Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League has reached the holiday break and while current COVID-19 lockdowns across Ontario makes it unsure when play will resume in 2021, plenty of accomplishments, past and present, are worth noting.

Here’s a look at some of them via NOJHL: By the Numbers:

1: That’s where the Timmins Rock sit in the league standings, No. 1 overall.

They boast a NOJHL-best .750 winning percentage, having gone 9-3-0 in their first dozen outings.

2: The two goaltenders to stop penalty shots in league play so far this season are Carson Boutin of Espanola and Tyler Masternak of Timmins.

3: It’s a three-way tie for the NOJHL scoring lead as 2020 nears a close.

Derek Seguin (Timmins); Quinton Hill (Hearst) and Noah Minns have all amassed 18 points for their respective clubs to date.

4: Brendan Boyce of the Rock leads all league defencemen in goals with four.

Timmins is also 4-0 in games in which he has found the back of the net.

5: Five NOJHL teams are perfect when leading after two periods of play so far this season.

They include Timmins (8-0); Hearst (6-0); Blind River (5-0) Soo Thunderbirds (3-0) and French River (2-0).

6: Six is the number of wins the Timmins Rock have racked up at home so far this season.

The are a league-best 6-0-0 at the friendly confines of McIntyre Arena.

Of the clubs that have seen game action so far this season, they are the only one to remain unbeaten on home ice.

7: Leading all netminders in the league in wins so far on the season is the Rock’s Tyler Masternak with seven.

8: Eight goals are the number that both Jacob Kelly of the Blind River Beavers and Quinton Hill of the Hearst Lumberjacks have both notched so far.

That ties them for second in the NOJHL in that department.

9: This it the total number of power play points Blind River’s Noah Minns has produced so far this season.

This leads all skaters in the league in man advantage proficiency.

10: In their 10 games played so far, the Rayside-Balfour Canadians have supplied a league-high seven shorthanded goals.

No other club has more than three.

11: This is the number of points Beavers’ rookie Devin Mauro has collected to date.

That puts the 16-year-old forward second in offensive numbers among first-year players.

12: Timmins captain Derek Seguin leads all league skaters in tallies to date with 12.

A veteran of 150 NOJHL games, he has produced 164 points, including 84 markers.

13: Carson Cox of Hearst is currently leading all league defencemen in scoring.

The 19-year-old blueliner from Edmonton has 13 points to his credit, having scored twice while doling out 11 assists.

14: With 14 assists on the year, Tyson Moore of the Cochrane Crunch tops all players in the league in that category.

15: The 15 points Nicholas DeGrazia has accumulated so far this season leads the Rayside-Balfour Canadians.

16: This is the number of players who played in the Canadian Junior Hockey League last season that were slotted on the initial NHL Central Scouting ‘Players to Watch’ as a prelude to the 2021 NHL Draft.

Among that group is Rayside-Balfour’s DeGrazia, last season’s NOJHL Rookie of the Year.

17: This is the number worn by Zachary Demers of Hearst.

The first-year Lumberjacks’ forward leads all NOJHL rookies in offensive production with 12 points in as many games.

In all he has notched five goals and helped set-up seven others.

18: Lucas Adams of Blind River is 18 points shy of reaching the century mark in his NOJHL career.

Through his first 111 league outings, the 20-year-old from Keswick, Ont., scored 28 times and assisted on 54 more.

19: Wearing No. 19 for the French River Rapids back in 2018-19, Philippe Daoust went on to be selected in the sixth round, 158th overall, by the Ottawa Senators in the 2020 National Hockey League Draft.

The 18-year-old Barrie, Ont., product spent the 2018-19 campaign with French River where he led all NOJHL rookies in offensive production with 59 points in 56 games on 20 goals and 39 assists.

20: Did you know that the NOJHL record for most shorthanded goals in a single season was set by the Cochrane Crunch in 2014-15?

That year they notched 20 man-down markers.

League teams have combined for 22 shorthanded tallies so far in 2020-21.

21: It has been 21 straight appearances since Timmins goalkeeper Tyler Masternak has faced over 40 shots in a game.

The last time it happened was back on Nov. 23, 2019 when he stopped 46 of the 47 attempts, he saw to backstop the Rock to a narrow 2-1 triumph in Blind River while going on to be named the game’s first star.

22: Back on the 22nd of November, Ty Chambers and Levi Siau both had five points in a win over Espanola.

That ties them for the most by any player in a game so far this season with the Beavers’ Jacob Kelly, who put up a five-spot on Dec. 15 against Rayside-Balfour.

23: Wearing No. 23 for the Blind River Beavers, Nicholas Jameus is the only player so far this season to score on a penalty shot.

He converted on his chance in his club’s first game of the season, back on Nov. 20, vs. the Soo Thunderbirds.

It also proved to be the game-winning goal.

24: Sporting No. 24 on his jersey, Espanola Express forward Bradley Brunet is playing at over a point-per-game clip so far this season.

With 12 in 10 outings, Brunet has already matched his personal single-season point numbers set last year with the Express.

25: Sitting tops in the NOJHL in power play success are the Espanola Express.

They boast a 25% success rate on the PP, having connected on 14 of their first 56 opportunities.

26: Wearing No. 26 for the Hearst Lumberjacks, Carson Cox has already set a single-season best mark for points in a campaign.

His 13 points to date are two more than the defenceman had last season in Hearst.

27: This is the number of multi-point games Josh Dickson of the Timmins Rock has had in his NOJHL career.

28: Did you know the NOJHL player record for most power play goals in a single season is 28.

Shawn Dubois accomplished this feat back in 1988-89 with Elliot Lake as did former NHLer Steve Sullivan with the Timmins Golden Bears during the 1991-92 campaign.

29: So far this season, teams that have scored first in games have won 29 times against just eight defeats and four shootout setbacks.

30: Soo Thunderbirds No. 30, Alex Bugeja sits tied for the league-lead in save percentage at .938 with Timmins netminder Masternak.

31: The Kirkland Lake Gold Miners have been shorthanded 31 times early in their regular season.

Having allowed only four goals against, KL leads the league in overall penalty kill prowess at 87.1%.

32: This was the number of hat tricks that were produced in the league last year.

So far this season, six players have produced three-tally outings. (Devon Savignac, Espanola; Griffin Simpson, French River; Nicholas DeGrazia, Rayside-Balfour; Owen Perala, Rayside-Balfour; Jacob Kelly, Blind River and Cameron Walker, Espanola.)

33: This is the number of NOJHL victories Rayside-Balfour goalkeeper David Bowen has in his career.

Only Timmins’ Masternak has more among active netminders with 68.

34: This was the total number of power play goals Caleb Serre supplied for Blind River in his stellar NOJHL career.

35: Wearing No. 35 for the Timmins Rock, goaltender Tyler Masternak has been incredible for his club.

In his past 35 starts, he sports an impressive 28-6-1 record.

36: This is the number of points Timmins captain Derek Seguin is shy of to reach 200 in his NOJHL career.

37: In the past five seasons, 37 skaters scored 30 or more goals in a single campaign.

Topping that list was former Kirkland Lake sniper Logan Fredericks with 51 and ex-Cochrane standout Hunter Atchison with 50, who both did it in 2015-16.

Meanwhile, in 2014-15, Cody Gratton scored 52 times for the Crunch.

38: The NOJHL mark for most wins by a goaltender in a single season is 38.

This was registered by Eddie Davey of the then Abitibi Eskimos in 2009-10.

39: Hearst Lumberjacks head coach Marc-Alain Bégin scored 39 times for the then Abitibi Eskimos during the 2009-10 campaign.

That same season he led the league in point-per-game average at 2.45 and despite playing nine fewer games, the first team all-star at right wing finished second in NOJHL scoring, just one point behind the leader, while helping Abitibi win the championship.

It’s part of the 92 goals in total Bégin supplied in the NOJHL during his playing career, which also included 283 points.

40: A commanding force in 1999-2000, the Rayside-Balfour Sabrecats joined the 1989-90 Sudbury Cubs as the only clubs in league history to go unbeaten in the regular season.

Both squads posted superb 40-0 records.

41: The NOJHL has played 41 games so far in this COVID-19-challenged 2020-21 regular season.

The league saw 22 match-ups contested in November and 19 more in December.

42: This is the number of games Timmins’ Tyler Masternak has played in which he has allowed one or fewer goals against in a contest that he started.

The NOJHL record holder for career shutouts with 17, also boasts 25 other appearances in league play in which he only let one goal get past him when starting.

43: This was the number of power play points 2019-20 NOJHL MVP Caleb Serre racked up for Blind River last season.

Serre also notched a league-best 17-man advantage markers along with setting up 26 others while the Beavers were up a skater. That also paced all players.

44: There are currently four players in the league that wear No. 44.

They include Cochrane rookie netminder Julien Lefebvre, French River forward Kyle Munyankuge, Rayside-Balfour defenceman Wilson Farrow and Timmins forward Tyler Schwindt.

45: Espanola netminder Owen Willis has made 45 or more saves in each of his past three starts.

In all, the Express stopper has handled 145 shots in total in that span.

46: Last season saw NOJHL netminders post 46 shutouts.

Leading the way was Masternak’s league single-season record eight.

He also has one of the four supplied so far this season.

Michael Nickolau (Cochrane) and Gavin McCarthy (Timmins) also have one each while Zachary Reddy/Kohl Reddy (Kirkland Lake) shared one back on December 13.

47: The Hearst Lumberjacks presently pace the NOJHL in goals scored with 47.

48: The NOJHL record for most wins in a season is 48.

Setting that mark was the Soo Thunderbirds back in 2013-14.

49: Only four players produced more than 49 assists in league play last season.

They include Caleb Serre, (F) Blind River (66); Gregory Trudeau-Paquet, (F) Powassan (52); Parker Bowman, (F) Powassan (50) and Mattais Salem, (D) Espanola (50).

50: Back 50 years ago, the Sudbury Wolves won the NOJHL championship, claiming the league title for the 1970-71 campaign.

Sudbury went 39-7-2 that year en route to winning the crown.

The Wolves’ Al Blanchard and Al Hamill tied for the league’s scoring lead with 113 points apiece while North Bay Trappers netminder Bob Dupuis was named MVP.
With files from NOJHL Historian, David Harrison.