WHEELING, WV- The Wheeling Nailers, proud ECHL affiliate of the Pittsburgh Penguins, are excited to announce that Sam Houde has been chosen as the Inglasco ECHL Player of the Week for December 13-19.
Houde, 21, was in the running for Inglasco ECHL Player of the Week from the time the puck dropped on Wheeling's three-game road trip to Norfolk. Sam scored two goals and added an assist in the first period on Wednesday, then proceeded to add one goal and two assists in the remainder of the game to finish the 7-2 triumph with three goals, three assists, and six points. The six-point game was the first by a Nailer since T.J. Fox on February 6, 2010. The forward kept his point streak rolling in Friday's 3-1 win, when he assisted on Jared Cockrell's power play marker in the third period. Finally, in Saturday's 9-2 thumping, three more points went Houde's way, as he scored one of the team's four goals in the first period, then assisted on two more in the middle frame. Sam finished the week with four goals, six assists, ten points, and a +6 rating.
This is the Blainville, Québec native's first season playing professional hockey, and he has spent time at both the AHL and ECHL levels. Houde has tallied one goal and one assist in eight contests with the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, and has four goals, nine assists, and 13 points in seven games with Wheeling. Prior to turning pro, he played five seasons of junior hockey with the QMJHL's Chicoutimi Saguenéens, and averaged more than a point per game in his final two campaigns.
Houde is the first Nailers rookie to earn Inglasco ECHL Player of the Week since Christian Hilbrich in January of 2017.
On behalf of Sam Houde, a case of pucks will be donated to a Wheeling youth hockey organization by Inglasco, the exclusive puck supplier of the ECHL. Since beginning its sponsorship of the award in 2000-01, Inglasco has donated more than 45,000 pucks to youth hockey organizations in ECHL cities.
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