The Philippine men’s national ice hockey team ended its first-ever IIHF World Championships stint on a rousing note by taking down Kuwait in a 14-0 rout in its final match in the Division IV tournament on Sunday at the Steppe Arena in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.
The team gained promotion to Division III B for next year’s Worlds after an impressive three-game sweep, including the crucial 7-6 OT win against the host just the other day.
It all started with a single goal in the first period, with Kenwrick Sze opening the day with a good finish for his sixth goal of the tournament at the 2:41 mark.
Four more goals in the following period, starting with back-to-back power play finishes from the assistant captain Carl Montano in the 23rd and 26th minutes of the game, set up the offensive onslaught with a 5-0 lead after 40 minutes.
The Philippines then opened the floodgates in the third and final period to book their promotion in devastating fashion.
Captain Manvill Billones carved two unanswered goals at the start of the third for his fourth and fifth of the tournament to kick off the scoring.
The forward then closed the game with an assist to Miguel Relampagos, finishing his Nationals debut with a tournament-high 12 points on five goals and seven assists. Four of these 12 points came in this game, as the captain finished with four points on those two goals and two assists.
Relampagos showed up with three markers on that game-closing goal and two prior assists, pulling the Philippines’ depth up with a superb performance for the third line.
Paolo Spafford made sure to make the breakthrough sweet with a clean sheet, denying any puck passing through his guard, with a total of seventeen attempts from Kuwait.
His counterpart, Dhari Alomran, had to save 53 shots from the Philippines, saving 43 of them.
