Corridor Cross Checks: Another Hryckowian shining for Cedar Rapids RoughRiders

CEDAR RAPIDS — It’s Ritzy, Part II.

Justin Hryckowian, a.k.a. the original Ritzy, played for the Cedar Rapids RoughRiders in the 2019-20 season. He’s tearing it up right now as a sophomore at Northeastern University, where he has nine goals and eight assists in 14 games.

His younger brother, Dylan, is a part of this RoughRiders team. Make that an important, productive part of this team.

The 18-year-old from Montreal has six goals and eight assists in 14 games for C.R. He’s coming off a weekend in which he scored a goal in one game against the United States National Team Development Program’s younger team and had two goals and two assists in the other game.

“It’s been great,” Dylan Hryckowian said. “Obviously from my brother being here in the past, I had a good idea of what it was going to be like. It has lived up to all the expectations, for sure. I love it here. I’ve got great billets. Obviously the team is doing well right now. I’ve got great teammates, a great coaching staff.”

Ritzy, Part II said he always has looked up to his brother, which is why he eschewed playing major junior hockey in Quebec and decided to go the prep school, U.S. junior and U.S. collegiate route. He’ll follow Justin to Northeastern.

“We’re completely different players,” Dylan said. “He’s a bigger guy than I am, likes to stay out front, tip pucks. He’s a centerman, so he wins a lot of faceoffs, is a really good player in that way. I feel like with me, it’s more of the skating and stuff like that that separates me from my brother.”

The brothers train together in the offseason, communicate every day. Justin Hryckowian’s season in Cedar Rapids was limited to 17 games by a concussion, an expected second didn’t happen at all because the RoughRiders were forced to take the 2020-21 season off because of a derecho that made ImOn Ice uninhabitable.

He played for Sioux City instead.

“I knew I was kind of in good hands because my brother has gone through it before me,” Dylan said. “So when he wanted to go to college, I was like, yeah. I’ve always looked up to him. Everything he does, I want to do.”

The RoughRiders split their games against The Program, losing 4-3 and winning 8-2. They are 7-6-2-0 for 16 standings points, which places them in a tie for fourth place in the Western Conference with Dubuque and Muskegon, seven points behind first-place Chicago.

This week at the rink

The RoughRiders have their annual Thanksgiving night game Thursday at Waterloo, then host the Black Hawks on Saturday night at 7:05. It’s the club’s annual Teddy Bear Toss Night.

The Iowa Heartlanders play four games in five days this week. That would be on the road Wednesday at Kalamazoo and Friday at Indy.

Then it is home games Saturday night and Sunday afternoon against the Cincinnati Cyclones. Saturday night is Military Appreciation Night.

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