Goaltender Eri Kiribuchi, born in Japan, learned hockey in the Czech Republic, and now attending Bemidji State University in Minnesota, USA, playing for the Japanese national team for the first time in her career against USA at the 2009 IIHF Women’s World Championship in Finland. She gave up 4 goals against the world champions in half the game in Japan’s 0-8 loss in pool play, she looks to be a key piece for the future of the Japanese national team as she is the only person playing outside of the country and in the de facto women’s elite league that is NCAA Division I.
Posts Tagged ‘national team’
Eri Kiribuchi at the Worlds
Posted by japanstats on 2009 April 22日 Wednesday
Posted in 02_English, hockey, information, International, Japan | Tagged: 2009, bemidji, finland, IIHF, Japan, national team, ncaa, USA, video, women, world championship, worlds | Leave a Comment »
Chris Yule to Nippon Paper Cranes!
Posted by japanstats on 2008 June 7日 Saturday
For whatever reason, the Seibu Prince Rabbits’ Chris Yule, a Team Japan veteran, had been released by the club following the 2007-08 season, even though with 10 goals and 25 assists for 35 points in 30 games he was tied for 5th in the league in scoring! Well, the Nippon Paper Cranes have signed the 33 year old Yule (via Kataribe Jiro-san) who is amazingly going into his 15th season in Japan. The Cranes reached the AL playoff finals this year, and a top sniper in Masahito Nishiwaki (24 goals in 2006-07 was 5th in the league) is returning from a year in the ECHL and should be a stronger player than before he left Japan. With these additions, the Cranes will definitely be one of the favourites to win it all in AL 2008-09.
Posted in 02_English, Asia League Ice Hockey, ECHL, hockey, information, Japan, opinion | Tagged: chris yule, cranes, national team, nippon paper, nishiwaki, prince rabbits, seibu, yule | 2 Comments »
Japanese National Team Final Roster
Posted by japanstats on 2008 April 13日 Sunday
The final 23-man roster for the Japanese National Team (Pos, Name, Club Team) for the 2008 Ice Hockey World Championships Division I Group B in Sapporo, Japan (13-19 April):
GK 1 Haruna (Oji)
GK 29 Kikuchi (Seibu)
GK 30 Ishikawa (Cranes)
DF 2 Tonosaki, Jun (Cranes)
DF 4 Keller (Oji)
DF 5 Miyauchi (Seibu)
DF 6 Haga (Toyo Univ)
DF 23 Osawa (Cranes)
DF 24 Kawai (Seibu)
DF 27 Yanadori (Meiji Univ)
FW 7 Domeki (Oji)
FW 8 Kon (Seibu)
FW 9 Sato (Seibu)
FW 10 Kamino (Seibu)
FW 11 Nishiwaki (Dayton Bombers)
FW 13 Ogawa (Oji)
FW 14 Tanaka (Seibu)
FW 16 Obara (Seibu)
FW 17 Iimura (Cranes)
FW 18 Suzuki (Seibu)
FW 19 Saito, Takeshi (Oji)
The two university defensemen made the roster, they will be interesting to watch as they represent a future of Japanese hockey.
ECHL Dayton’s Nishiwaki is on the team, I’m interested in seeing how his play style changed after a year in NA.
Haruna should be the starting goalie, having the hot hand in the AL playoffs winning all 9 games to the championship and also in NT training camp and training matches. (He’s also my sentimental favourite, having been a long time Nikko IceBuck, singlehandedly keeping the team in too many games where they didn’t deserve, until he moved to Oji and finally captured a well deserved championship this year.)
Obara’s been playing great in the NT training and practice matches against Amur Khavarovsk. He should be a player to watch.
Cranes had a poor year, and that’s represented in the final roster of the NT.
Despite Ukraine’s presence, this is Japan’s best chance for promotion with the first home tournament in 25 years! Go Japan!
Puck drops now for the first game of the tournament!!
Posted in 02_English, Asia League Ice Hockey, ECHL, hockey, information, International, Japan, opinion | Tagged: hokkaido, ihwc, national team, roster, sapporo, world championship | Leave a Comment »
Japan vs Amur Khavarovsk
Posted by japanstats on 2008 April 6日 Sunday
Game details of the Japanese national team’s 2 warm up matches against Amur Khavarovsk (this team sent its 3rd team Golden Amur into the Asia League a few seasons ago, and has been playing practices matches against various Japanese teams in the years since then, hopefully they’ll make a return to the Asia League in the near future. The continued relationship with Japanese hockey is promising.)
———–
Game 1 (Tomakomai, Hokkaido, Japan) 1 April 2008
Japan 4(３-３、１-１、０-０)4 Amur
Goals
１P
01:48 JPN 1-0 (G)Obara (A)Tanaka (A)Okubo (PPG)
04:08 AMU 1-1 (G)36 (A)21 (PPG)
04:31 JPN 2-1 (G)Suzuki (A)Sato (A)Mitani
08:22 AMU 2-2 (G)9 (A)5 (A)2
16:06 AMU 3-2 (G)10 (A)37 (A)5 (PPG＋2）
19:37 JPN 3-3 (G)Yamashita (A)Okubo (A)Obara (PPG)
２Ｐ
04:29 JPN 4-3 (G)Suzuki
13:48 AMU 4-4 (G)35 (A)77 (A)10 (PPG)
Shoot Out
Japan 1(○-×、×-×、×-×)0 Amur
1：Tanaka ○
2：Kuji ×
3：Obara×
Lines
1st Kuji 〜 Kon 〜 Takeshi Saito 〜 Jun Tonosaki 〜 Osawa
2nd Sato 〜 Mitani 〜 Suzuki 〜 Keller 〜 Haga
3rd Kei Tonosaki 〜 Obara 〜 Domeki 〜 Miyauchi 〜 Yamashita
4th Kamino 〜 Go Tanaka 〜 Ogawa / Iimura 〜 Okubo 〜 Kawai
GK Kikuchi 4 GA (60:00)
Game MVP
Yamashita （Oji）
———–
Game 2 (Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan) 3 April 2008
Japan 2(０-０、１-１、１-０)1 Amur
Goals
２P
0:46 JPN 1-0 (G)Obara (A1)Iimura (A2)Keller (PPG＋2）
1:52 AMU 1-1 (G) 9 (A1)24
３Ｐ
3:28 JPN 2-1 (G)Obara (A1)Takeshi Saito (A2)Osawa (PPG）
SOG
Japan 24-19 Amur
Penalties
Japan 8-9 Amur
Shoot Out Exhibition
Japan １(○-×、×-○、×-×)１ Amur
1：Takeshi Saito
2：Kamino
3：Domeki
Lines
1st Kamino 〜 Go Tanaka 〜 Ogawa 〜 Kawai 〜 Yanadori
2nd Domeki 〜 Kon 〜 Takeshi Saito 〜 Jun Tonosaki 〜 Osawa
3rd Kei Tonosaki 〜 Okuyama 〜 Uchiyama 〜 Keller 〜 Haga
4th Sato 〜 Obara / Iimura 〜 Kuji 〜 Okubo 〜 Yamashita
GK Haruna (Oji) GA １ (60:00)
Game MVP
Obara (SEIBU)
It turns out all 3 university players, Haga, Kuji, and Yanadori
got a look in the 2 test matches against Amur, turns out I didn’t look
carefully enough on my blog post earlier (doh!) They look to be promising
young players.
Obara is hot, and Haruna continued to look strong in goal, after winning 9 straight AL playoff games (only allowing more than 2 goals once) leading Oji to the championship and will probably be Japan’s main goalie in the tournament as Fukufuji (who became the first Japanese NHLer last season) is tied up in the ECHL playoffs with the Bakersfield Condors during IHWC.
I have no clue what calibre of players Amur brought over for these games because names were not given in the game reports (what?) But probably they’re probably similar to the Golden Amur players (young player and over the hill veterans that participated in the AL a few seasons ago for Amur’s 3rd team).
Japanese national team currently has 30 players in camp, and the roster will get pared down to its proper roster for the IIHF World Championship in Sapporo which starts on the 13th.
Posted in 02_English, Asia League Ice Hockey, hockey, information, International, Japan, opinion | Tagged: amur, division i, ihwc, IIHF, khavarovsk, national team, Oji, sapporo, seibu, world championship | Leave a Comment »
IHWC Div I 2008: Japan NT preparations
Posted by japanstats on 2008 April 5日 Saturday
The Japanese national team has been preparing to host the IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship Division I tournament at Sapporo in the northern island of Hokkaido, Japan. The games will run 13 – 19 April against Ukraine, Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, and Croatia.Since the end of the Asia League season, the national team has been in training in Hokkaido and has recently played 2 practice matches against Amur of Khavarovsk (an RSL team, but no idea what kind of roster the team brought over, as the box scores only indicate uniform numbers and no names).
Game 1 ended in a 4-4 tie. All goals were scored by the 34th minute in a flurry of a first half. One of the two remaining university players, standout defenseman Haga was used in the 2nd pairing with Aaron Keller. And High1 defenseman Okubo was used in the 4th pairing, but successfully quarterbacked the power play and assisted on 2 PPGs. Kikuchi (Seibu) allowed 4 goals, though the number of shots was not recorded.
Japan eked out a 2-1 win in game 2 against an Amur squad that was fresher after a day of rest. Obara (Seibu) scored both goals on the power play this game, and combined with his 2 PP points (1G + 1A) in game 1 and has been playing great. Haruna (Oji) continued his hot play from the AL playoffs where he reeled off 9 straight victories (only allowing more than 2 goals in a single game), as he only let in 1 of the 19 shots he faced. Haruna has the hot hand and the original Japanese NHLer Fukufuji will be tied up in the ECHL playoffs with the Bakersfield Condors, so the Oji veteran should be the starting goalie in the upcoming tournament. AL’s top scorer in recent seasons Nishiwaki who is playing with the Dayton Bombers this season, and if his team loses in the first round of the playoffs (a best of 3 play in series), then he’ll be able to squeak into Sapporo for the start of the tournament.
JIHL/ALIH and Japanese national team veteran Ryan Kiyoshi Fujita, who always plays way above his size, was nowhere to be seen over the Amur games although he’s listed on the long list of players in training camp. It’s unknown whether he was dropped because of injury, fitness, or team plans.
Posted in 02_English, Asia League Ice Hockey, ECHL, hockey, information, International, Japan, opinion | Tagged: amur, asia league, bakersfield, bombers, condors, croatia, dayton, estonia, Fukufuji, hokkaido, hungary, ihwc, IIHF, khavarovsk, lithuania, national team, sapporo, seibu, tsukisamu, ukraine | Leave a Comment »
Japanese National Teams News
Posted by japanstats on 2008 February 2日 Saturday
According to Japanese ice hockey commentator “Kataribe” Jiro-san (Japanese), JIHF has announced the national team selection schedule (information not on JIHF site yet) for the senior national teams that will be competing in this year’s IIHF World Championships. Japan will host the men’s Division I Group B tournament in Sapporo, Hokkaido at the Tsukisamu Arena.
Preliminary selections of 40 players for the men’s team and 30 players for the women’s team will be announced on 9 February in Kushiro, Hokkaido.
The men’s roster will be trimmed down to 30 players at the 1 March announcement. (Location TBA.)
Men’s selection camp with the 30 players will be held starting on 31 March in Tomakomai, Hokkaido. 2 training matches will be scheduled (opponents TBD) and the final roster of 23 players will be announced in Sapporo on 12 April, the day before the start of the tournament.
Dates and locations above are subject to change, and further details for the women’s team selection process was not announced.
Posted in 02_English, 03_Translations (英訳ポートフォリオ), hockey, information, International, Japan, JIHF | Tagged: division i, ice hockey, ihwc, IIHF, Japan, JIHF, national team, world championship | 1 Comment »
