In the 2014-2015 season, FHC lost to Flint Powers in the state quarter finals. Last year, FHC fell to Grand Rapids Catholic Central. They have graduated multiple talented seniors. Naturally, the Rangers are underestimated this season. They are seemingly taking a new approach after the loss of numerous seniors and so much hockey experience. According to their head coach, it is time to redefine themselves.

“I think we are a gritty team that works hard,” head coach Kevin Zaschak said. “Night in and night out I think we are going to surprise a lot of teams. We graduated a lot the last two years, and I think teams won’t expect us to be as good as we are.”

When most people think about a gritty team they would usually think defense. The coaching staff and the players acknowledge that it starts with the defense. Zaschak said that their approach all year will be to lock down the D-zone. He also knows that it is a huge luxury to have two outstanding goalies in senior Drake Deering and sophomore Carl Mielock.

“Our plan is to shut down the D-zone first,” senior captain Mackey Withey said. “We rely on our goaltending for sure and then just stay smart with no penalties. We’ll need to bank on getting some power plays because we can use that to our advantage.”

The Rangers took the same approach to the game last night. They started by locking down the D-zone with a shutout. FHC then got up the ice and countered with 6 goals of their own. They were looking for some form of revenge as they had lost to Lowell/Caledonia in a game earlier this year in their fall league.

“We played great,” Zaschak said. “We played these guys a few weeks ago and lost 4-1 because they outworked us. Our goal today was just keep working. We knew they were going to come at us, so our focus was to work and battle. I knew we had the talent to compete with them. We just needed to work.”

The coaching staff had a lot of positive takeaways from the game that they hope to carry throughout the rest of the season. After the final buzzer went off, Zaschak had a strong message for the team: just continue to work.