ORLANDO, Fla. – The sixth season of the Southern Professional Hockey League may very well go down as the year of the scorer as two offensive records were broken in a span of three days this week.
On Thursday night, Mississippi Surge forward Matt Zultek became the league’s most prolific power play goal scorer. On the road in Knoxville, Zultek notched his 26th and 27th man advantage goals of the season. The previous record had been 25 goals, held by Columbus’ Ryan Rutz since the 2006-2007 season. Rutz accomplished his mark in 54 games that season. It took Zultek just 40 games to top the record
Zultek, a native of Mississauga, Ontario, also reached 40 goals for the season with his two tallies on Thursday. It put him in a very elite group as just the fourth SPHL player to reach the 40-goal plateau in a season. He joins Columbus forward Tim Green (41 in 2005-2006), Knoxville forward KJ Voorhees (44 in 2004-2005) and Florida/Fayetteville forward Rob Sich (46 in 2006-2007) in the select club.
Not to be outdone, Sich upped the ante on his own record for most goals in a season. Friday night in Knoxville, he lit the lamp for the 46th time this year, tying the mark he set three years ago. Then on Saturday night, he notched his 47th at 15:31 of the first period to establish the new SPHL standard. He then added his 48th of the season on a power play at 3:55 of the third period.
Sich, who grew up in LaSalle, Ontario, set the previous mark in 50 games in 2006-2007. He tallied 17 goals for the Florida Seals in 26 games before the franchise went belly up. He then was signed by Fayetteville and scored 29 goals in 25 games for the FireAntz on the way to the team’s first President’s Cup championship. It took him just 44 games this year to break the record. He has posted 11 two-goal games and four three-goal games along the way.
Sich currently leads the SPHL in scoring with 76 points while Zultek is in fifth place with 58 points.
Contact the author at don.money@prohockeynews.com
