IRVINE, Calif. — The chant of “Duuuval!” echoed throughout the arena at Great Park Ice on Sunday.
It was fitting, after all, because a team from Duval County can now call itself a national champion. Players bellowed the county’s name after the Jacksonville Jr. Icemen (FL) won the 2A title at the 2026 Chipotle-USA Hockey Youth Tier II 16U National Championship.
Behind a natural hat trick from Hayden Brasiel, the Icemen pulled away from the Princeton Jr. Tigers (NJ) to win 5-1.
“It’s just a testament to what we do there [with the program], that it’s working and we believe in what we do,” Jacksonville coach Kyle Shapiro said.
Shapiro has built the program from one team when he took over the Jr. Icemen four seasons ago to a current stable of more than 13 competitive teams and more on the recreational level.
It also helps when you are able to snag a player such as Brasiel.
Princeton’s Jacob Rotenberg and Jacksonville’s Corbyn Cady traded first-period goals before Brasiel started lighting up the scoreboard. He snapped the 1-1 tie just 1:26 into the second period, then made it 3-1 with 4:48 left in the second. The center capped off his hat trick just 11 seconds into the final period.
“Just means everything,” Brasiel said. “Coming from Jacksonville, we didn’t have that big of support behind us, but we had fans and coaches and people back home watching us and supporting us. It just was awesome just to win it for them and to get their support.”
Alexander Sobolev completed the scoring, notching a power-play goal with 1:03 remaining.
Jacksonville’s defense was pretty good, too. It was Nathan Lerner’s game between the pipes in a two-goaltender rotation with Jackson Rew. Lerner stopped 33 shots as he finished the tournament with a 1.92 goals-against average, just behind the Rew’s tournament-best 1.67.
Brasiel, who scored the overtime winner in the 5-4 quarterfinal win over WEHL Southeast (WI), finished with the most goals (10) and most points (13) in the tournament. He credited his teammates for being locked in for the championship game, but he was clearly ready for the moment as well.
“I was ready to go,” he said. “I was hyped before the whistle even blew. I was dialed in and I really just wanted to get that win for the team.”
For Princeton, just making it to the championship game was quite an accomplishment. The Tigers had battled a numbers issue all season and came to nationals with 11 skaters and were down to 10 for the title game due to an injury.
“It was definitely a war of attrition of sorts for us,” Tigers coach Travis Beni said. “I know we had a couple of kids that were playing through injuries, but there’s not anybody else to fill their spot, right? So they have to just keep fighting.”
Shapiro knows his program will get more notice now, but he is just happy trying to develop Florida kids into hockey players.
“It changes every year in youth hockey,” Shapiro said. “The goal is hopefully one or two of them can play at a high level in five, six years from now. So that’s kind of the way that we look at, the way I look at it. It’s just the job is about them and make sure that they love doing it and if they want to continue to do it down the road, then that’s great.”
Story from Red Line Editorial, Inc.