Week Two - September 19th

Taqwa V Ihsan - 8PM

Last week's winners will come together for an early chance to claim sole spot of the top spot in the standings for the season. Surprisingly, despite the radical turnover on both teams, the teams ultimately remained loyal to the style of hockey they played last season.

Taqwa remains a high-octane offensive force with a large number of offensively threatening players with little interest in defense. However, with Ibad Khan in goal, that hardly seems a pressing issue any longer.

Ihsan remained a gritty defense-first team which prefers a grinding style of hockey. With a shortened bench last week, it looked like Ihsan ran out of gas at some point and spent the rest of the game stuck in their own zone. Still, the team bent and didn't break as they continued to grind and battle until the clock ran out.

Due to week one absenses, a few players will look to make their debut this week. This include, Usama Mahmood and Yusuf Ingar from Ihsan as well as Safi Ahmed and Muhammad Bilal from Taqwa.

Player To Watch: Omar Husain has some silky, smooth hands. While the youngster will likely take time to fully adapt to Tier-1 hockey, he showed flashes of brilliance in week one.

Emaan V Sabr - 10PM

Both teams came out of the losing end last week and will be highly motivated to shake off last Friday's disappointment.

Emaan's defeat came in a game which was far closer than the score indicated. We all hate hockey cliche's about "the bounces" but a ball literally bounced on the goal-line for Emaan was likely in the net but was quickly batted out before a referee could confirm a goal. Add that to hitting the post and running into a hot goaltender in general, Emaan certainly believes that the game could have turned their way if they had gotten the right bounces.

Sabr seemed stunned out of the gate against Taqwa but soon after began competing at a higher level. Unfortunately, that was only after surrendering some game deciding goals. Otherwise the team did seem out of sync on the power-play and in other situations. Players like Shuaib Hussain will need to find ways to ingrain himself with the team instead going their own way on the floor.

Player To Watch: Haseeb Syed is nothing short of a handful for his opponents with his unrelenting aggressiveness on the floor. He can single-handedly lift his team with a great play or sink them with a bad penalty. In either case, he's a game-changer.