The Morning Star from Vernon, British Columbia, Canada • 17

Friday, May 1 1 1 990 The Morning Star 17 dm 4 Mr Hockey speaks at Centennial Cup banquet Aftor 0 anrn 1 -i. After 26 of years plavine the Wayne Grctzky would like him to -S jr Don Montelth of the Vernon Lakers scored this goal earlier this week against the Amherst Ramblers. Morning Star photo by Brad Moore game, he's still one of its biggest fans. Gordie Howe, known as Mr. Hockey, was on hand Thursday to speak at the Centennial Cup Banquet and host a golf tournament at Vemon Golf and Country Club.

During his illustrious career, Howe achieved a number of records including: the first player to surpass the 1,000 goal plateau, the first father-sen combination in major sports, most games played (1767) and most seasons played (26). Currently he divides his time up between charity work, promoting his book: After the Applause, and the Hartford Whalers Hockey Club. He also follows closely the career of his son Mark, who plays with the Philadelphia Flyers, One of Howe's biggest fans, Los Angeles Kings superstar play one more game of hockey in the NHL. Howe is interested in the idea but said he would have a tough time deciding which team to play for. The Kings would like to see Howe and Grctzky line-up together and the Whalers want him to appear for them, since he is currently on their payroll.

He would also like to play with his son in Philadelphia. But he added: "All it's been is talked about right now," he said of a possible comeback. Howe had some strong words for today's NHL and junior players. "If you looked at the old hockey films you'd find that when the whistle blew the play was over. I don't like the after the whistle hits.

We never did much of that," he said. "We usually played each other another 14 times so you could get back at somebody if you wanted." ''A Gordie Howe MARCEL Mill HO Ann Cyclist wins two races in Tour of the North Royals undefeated in Centennial Cup with win over Hawks The Nipawin Hawks silenced a few critics Wednesday night in their game against the New Westminster Royals. And for those people who had ignored them, it gave them something to talk about. "Nobody gave us any credit when we came here," said Nipawin coach Bob Lowes after his team lost 3-2 to the Royals. "A lot of people ignored us, but we came here to play and win something.

We didn't come here to be tourists." For the Royals, it was one of their most difficult win of the Untenmal Cup Championships. New Westminster goaltender Todd Jones had to make 28 saves in the contest. The most saves required by either one of the Royals' two goalies. Nipawin mobilized their best effort in the second and third periods, when they attacked their opposition with fierce fore-checking. They were rewarded late in the second period when they scored their only two goals.

"We got stronger as the game went on. I felt at the end of the game it was anybody's hockey game," said Lowes. Nipawin were decisively out-played in the first period. The Royals had 16 shots on Hawks' goalie Lauren Belland in the first period, while Nipawin could only respond with five. Things balanced themselves out in the second period.

But the Hawks really came to play in the third period, with 12 shots on goal to the Royals 10. "I think the win gave us a lot of confidence," said the Royals' Jones about Nipawin's performance against them. Jones was forced to make two tough saves in the final five minutes. Cory Malenfant and Sean Jackson were the only Hawks to beat Jones in the game. Their goals came at the 12:01 and 15:31 marks of the second period and gave their team a 2-1 advantage.

But a costly interference penalty late in the period gave the Royals the man advantage and the chance to tie it up. Don Dwyer scored the power play equalizer. Darwin McClelland scored his second goal of the championship with 6:52 remaining in the game. Nipawin could not tie the game but had a number of chance, including a breakaway with less than five minutes remaining. The win gives New Westminster first place in the round-robin portion of the championship.

The Royals (4-0) play Les Sieurs Du College Francais De Longueuil (1-3) in a semi-final game, 8 p.m. on Friday. The other semi-final game will be between the Vernon Lakers (3-1) and the Nipawin Hawks (2-2). Centennial Cup Notes: The top scorers in the championships are all Royals. Kelly Jones leads the way with nine points in four games.

Mark Karpen, Blaine Moore and Darwin McClelland follow in the points race. Vernon's Duvc Oliver and Rob Atkinson are tied for seventh spot with three goals and three assists each. In the goaltending department, the Lakers' Dean Kuntz has a .927 goals against average, good enough for second place behind Todd Jones. The Royals are also leading with their special teams. The Lower Mainland team has killed off 93.5 per cent of its penalties without allowing a goal.

Vernon trails with an 86.4 per cent penalty killing average. The Royals are 38.1 per cent effective on their power play, while the Lakers are 25 per cent effective. ls hi Cyclist Marcel Mulholland had an interesting indoctrination in to bike racing in B.C. The local junior racer competed last weekend in the Tour of the North and encountered some strange weather conditions during the three stage race, in and around Prince George. The more than 120 bike racers entered in the event encountered 150 kilometre gusts of wind and snow flurries.

Mulholland, 17, recently moved to Vernon from Mississauga, Ont, where he was ranked as one of the top 10 junior racers in that province. The race was his first of the season and first since moving to the area. Despite the conditions, Mulholland performed well. In Saturday's 75 kilometre road race he finished fourth. He followed that with firsts in a 15 kilometre time trial, Saturday, and a timed criterium, Sunday.

Even with two first place finishes, he was not able to make up the time he had lost in the road race and he finished fourth overall. The riders encountered fierce winds during the time trial. The wind worked for the racers on the way out but they had to struggle against it on the way back. Mulholland said the winds were measured as strong as 150 kph. During the criterium the riders raced with snow falling.

Although it didn't stick to the Marcel Mulholland on his time trial bike. Morning Star photo by Brian Monteith ground it made for extremely Island for top junior riders, cold riding. Martin Willock, who coaches the This weekend Mulholland will junior provincial team, will attend a camp on Vancouver provide instruction for the riders..