Glorious sunshine scale: 5/10
Temperature scale: 5/10 (a little on the chilly side)
Perfect number of players scale: 7/10 (one sub)
New players scale: 8/10 (Thom Gysler)
Return of long absent regulars scale: 8/10 (Neil Spencer's return)
Evenness of teams/series scale: 8/10 (very even teams today despite score disparity in a couple games)
Session intensity scale: 8/10 (one of the more intense sessions in a while)
Session openness / offensiveness scale: 5/10 (opened up a bit more in the second half)
Redemptions achieved scale: 7/10 (double reverse redemption in the best of 3 series)
Exceptional goaltending performance scale: 7/10 (both Dom and Sam were uber-solid today)
Domination by one player scale: 6/10 (Darrel was a force today)
Length of session scale: 8/10 (6 games in over 3 hours)
Fun of session scale: 8/10
Chance of future sessions in coming weeks scale: 7/10 (next Sunday is already penciled in but will depend on numbers and weather)

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Thanks, Bern! VRH is already in the swing of things with its second session of 2014 just three weeks into the new year. Leading the way today on the back of 18A was Andy, as his usual heaping of assists led his to 24P. In fact, he had more points than shots-on-goal! Darrel continues to impress as the two-time defending Most Improved Player co-led the day with 12G and finished at 19P. Third star was the returning Neil Spencer, who tied Darrel in goals in his second career session and threw up 15P. In goal, you can’t help but wonder if the goalies are being shortchanged on their stats, as Sam led the day .788-.769 over Dom. Pretty solid debut for Thom, who put up 7G today.

Game Scores:
Darrel Andrew Oliver Dom def. Stefan Thom Neil Bernie Dom 5-2
Andrew Stefan Bernie Neil Dom def. Darrel Thom Oliver Sam 5-4 4-5 5-2
Andrew Stefan Neil Sam def. Darrel Thom Oliver Bernie Dom 5-3
Andrew Oliver Thom Dom def. Darrel Stefan Bernie Neil Sam 5-4

Elo Ratings
Andrew Smart 2215 (+11)
Stefan Klopp 1999 (-16)
Oliver Koth-Kappus 1908 (-29)
Darrel Voser 1892 (+33)
Bernie Koth-Kappus 1526 (-10)

Provisional Elo Ratings (less than three sessions played
Neil Spencer 1848 (+22)
Thom Gysler 1788 (n/a)

Season Stats: With half of the players in this session making their season debuts, the season scoring race gets nice and jumbled. Andrew debuts in first at 24, followed by Stefan (22), Oliver (21), Darrel (19), and Neil (15)... Neil and Darrel are tied for the lead in goals at 12 followed by Stefan (11), Rob Hajdu (10), and Ollie (9)... Andrew already jumps out to a bit of a lead in assists with 18 followed by Oliver (12) and Stefan (10)... Neil and Darrel battle for the lead in shooting percentage, 29.27%-28.57%... Sam leads Dom in both save percentage (.818-.805), saves (162-140), and goalie star points (20-15)... Stefan, Sam, Bernie, Oliver, and Dom have played in all nine games thus far... Sam leads in total star points with 20; Rob, Dom, and Andrew all have 15 each... The top four highest-scoring sessions of this extremely young season were registered today, as well of four of the five top goal totals... Andrew destroys the season’s top assist mark with 18; no one else has more than seven in a session in 2014... Interestingly, no one was able to top rob’s 44 shots on goal from two weeks ago despite getting twice as many games to do so... The goalies bested their save marks but didn’t come close in save percentage or PPS compared to the first session.

SDF/GDF: Seamus holds the SDF for the fifth ranking in a row and 13th time overall (tying him with brother K.J.)... With Kellan falling under the session minimum, Andrew and Lee are now solidly second and third... Even with the big point hits today incurred by Andrew and Darrel on the rest of the crew, most everyone moves up thanks to a number of BUSH skaters dropping below the minimum... Darrel moves back into the top ten... For the fifth consecutive ranking, the top spot on the GDF changes again as Dom falls behind Bron, putting the Czech favourite on top for the 29th time in his career. Only four goalies are left above the session minimum now.

All-Time Session Milestones & Streaks

On the All-Time Front: Oliver is 15 points away from 2,900... Stefan needs 16 points to become the third player with 2,000... Andy is 22 points behind Justin Gordon for tenth... Darrel becomes the 29th player to score 300 points... Bernie needs just one assist to become the third player with 1,000... Andrew leaps ahead of both Rob and Lorne to move into seventh in assists; he also becomes the seventh player with 600 assists; he’s 56 behind Kyle Grenier for sixth... Sam is 132 saves behind Joern for ninth... Dom becomes the sixth player to play 700 games... Sam passes Rob and Laird for 13th in games played and is just one behind Graeme for 12th... Sam passes Seamus for ninth in games goaltended and is four behind Justin for eighth... Dom passes Stefan for sixth in total star points with 850... Andy ties Stefan for fourth in sessions led in scoring with 32; he’s just one behind Lorne for third... Bernie needs five more points to become the third player to score 1,100 points in VRH... Neil notches his first 15-pointer... Andrew ties Oliver for fourth in all-time 20-pointers with 29... Darrel records his second career ten-goaler, while Neil pots his first... Andy makes history as he has scored ten-or-more assists in eight straight full-length sessions, a new Burton record that passes the old mark he shared with Kyle Grenier... Dom’s .800 streak ends at four... Dom records his 65th career 80-saver, while Sam ties Chris Jackins for seventh at 23... Rob Hajdu tried his hardest to move the session to Sunday, but it was simply too nice of a day to pass up playing Saturday. As such, his consecutive session streak dating back nearly two seasons ends at 24 sessions. The new longest active streak holder is Oliver at 17. Dom is right behind at 16, and Bernie’s streak goes to nine.