It was the Summer of 2022 and it was obvious that something was needed to enable junior players, from the Oxford set-up, to progress into senior hockey. Oxford City Stars were playing in Division One in the National Ice Hockey League. The step from Under 18 to Division One was felt to be impossible, apart from the very few, so Division Two was targeted for a developmental team, that would hopefully be competitive, whilst developing individual players.
Oxford Rising Stars 2022/2023
A brand-new team for a new season – Who would benefit from the new team?
The team was launched to bridge the great divide between the Under 18 Oxford Junior Stars and the NIHL1 Oxford City Stars. This was seen by many as the most important announcement to come out of Oxford in the Summer of 2022. With the links that the Oxford City Stars had made with Bristol Pitbulls and their links with Cardiff Devils, it gave a continuous pathway from Junior to Elite Hockey.
How would they do? – Who would they sign? Under the Directorship of former Oxford City Stars Directors Paul Lynch and Russ Shrives, they appointed Coach Warren Jones. The former Stars player had been playing and assisting with the coaching at Basingstoke Buffalo, so was a natural fit. The team was going to need some experience to supplement the Under 18 players so Rising signed Sam Arnold and made him Club Captain. With over 100 games for the City Stars, he had most recently been playing Recreational hockey. They also bought in former City Stars player Jason Ikin and Oxford legend Andy Cox. Availability for Cox was to be an issue as he soon returned to Recreational hockey.
The team attracted some new players to the Oxford set-up. Ashlee Cave arrived with Chelmsford and Haringey on his CV, amongst others. Former Bracknell Junior Ben Mollitt was signed as the starting netminder with Tony Sutherland also donning the blocker and catching mitt. Youngsters Caden Hughes and Morgan Wickens joined, having previously been part of the Milton Keynes Junior set-up.
The season opened with a visit to the previous season’s champions Guildford Phoenix. The points were left in Surrey as the home side won 7-1. The following night the Rising Stars defeated Chelmsford Warriors 5-3 on home ice, in front of a bumper crowd, interested in seeing what the Rising Stars were all about. A mixture of wins and losses up until November and things seemed to be going well. Some of the Under 18 players, like Charlie Roche, were getting ice time that would stand them in good stead, later in the season when they also iced for the City Stars. November and December saw an overtime loss to Cardiff Fire and a win away at Solent by 8-4, giving the team scant rewards for their efforts.
Into the start of 2023, the line-up was depleted when Theo Bundock and Scott Anda moved, full-time, to the City Stars. Results did not improve with the only victory in 2023, coming against Lee Valley. Various other former City Stars players were bought in but failed to find that spark that was required to reignite the season. Rising Stars’ top scorer was shared between local players Ed Crotty and Ciaran Wilson. Wilson also accumulated the most penalty minutes for the team.
Overall, the season was a qualified success, with the first steps on that bridge taken. Moving forward, the mixture of experience and young players may need a little bit of refining as the benefits of the improving Junior set up at Oxford, start to produce more young home-grown players to choose from.
Season 2023/24
The nucleus of the previous season’s squad was retained. Exceptions to this were in the net as both Tony Sutherland and Ben Mollitt did not feature. A young netminder, Kayla Poole, was signed from the Bristol/Swindon set-up. Poole would go onto post a .874 save percentage, logging nearly 1000 minutes of ice time. Her backup was shared by Under 18 Taylor Merrell and the veteran Kevin McGurk.
Chris Beckett joined from Chelmsford Warriors and former Oxford City Stars players Joe Edwards and Jacob Smith returned to the game. Former Oxford Junior Club and Oxford City Stars Coach Jeff Sykora was also to return and it was his input, both on and off the ice, that helped shape the improvement in form, towards the end of the season and saw him pick up the Clubman of the Year award at the end of the season awards evening.
One of the biggest disappointments of the season was the limited game time for defenceman Charlie Roche. He suffered an early season training injury, played 4 games for the Rising Stars and then served the remainder of the season under suspension.
The problems encountered at Swindon Ice Rink, saw the Swindon team pull out of the league, and problems with ice conditions at Oxford, were to delay the start of the season with the Rising Stars only playing a combined total of 3 games before November.
The season started in a similar fashion to the previous year, with a heavy loss at one of the title favourites, this time against Bristol Pitbulls. The first home game, against Chelmsford Warriors, saw the first win of the season with a 6-2 win. The team then hit freefall losing eight games on the bounce. The closest to success was a penalty shoot-out loss at Chelmsford. A home win versus Lee Valley rounded out the 2023 fixtures.
Changes to the coaching set-up were made as former Oxford City Stars defenceman Darryl Morvan was bought into running the bench supporting Warren Jones who continued to be the team’s most effective forward and eventually topped the team scoring charts for both goals and total points.
January saw back-to-back wins over the Streatham Blackhawks. The home game, which ended 9-5, ended with players from both sides involved in several melees. The two inexperienced referees allocated to the game called two penalties on each side. Step forward to the much-vaunted Department of Player Safety, ice hockey’s version of football’s VAR, and having reviewed the video, adjudicated further suspensions on various players, for varying lengths of time. This didn’t deter the Rising Stars as their depleted squad travelled to London, the following week, and secured the 5-2 win.
Losses to Peterborough sandwiched a surprise defeat at Lee Valley. Performances then improved with a win over Solent Junior Devils and good performances against Haringey Huskies and Invicta Mustangs, including a 5-4 win over the Mustangs in the last home game of the season.
Over the closing weeks, opportunities were given to some of the Oxford Under 18 players and none of them looked out of place. Netminder, Poole made her debut for the Oxford City Stars in Division One, getting the final 20 minutes in the game, and again, did not look out of place.