AURORA, Ontario — As we enter the month of December in the OJHL, the Aurora Tigers find themselves in the middle of the pack. In the league’s East Division, the Tigers sit third out of five teams, five points behind the second-place Collingwood Blues and a whopping 15 points ahead of the fourth-place Markham Royals. While they do have a significant lead over the latter club, the Tigers must not be complacent, especially with the holiday break just around the corner.

To the club’s credit, though, the Tigers have been anything but complacent. In fact, Aurora is 11-9-1 on the year, including a 7-3-0 mark away from home. One of the major reasons for the Tigers’ success as of late – and all season, really – has been thanks to the outstanding play of forward Justin Biraben, who has 22 points thus far, behind only Luc Reeve for the club lead.

I recently spoke to Aurora head coach Greg Johnston, who did not hesitate to give Biraben a justified testimonial.

“He’s obviously had a heck of a start to the season,” Johnston said. “He’s a natural goal-scorer that knows how to play the game. He plays it the right way, plays it hard, plays on a bit of an edge. As long as he controls that little bit of an edge, it works in his favor. If you cross that line, you get [a few] issues.”

One issue, in fact, resulted in Biraben receiving a two-game suspension in recent weeks.

“Obviously, a two-game suspension, that’s going to happen when you play this type of game, where you play aggressively,” Johnston added before elaborating on his responsibilities as the club’s bench boss. “As a coach, you have to try to curb that a little bit but let him have the freedom to play on that edge because you want guys out that have that freedom.”

For Johnston, though, he admits that it’s been a real treat watching Biraben succeed but also to witness the youngster’s uncompromised work ethic.

“He’s creative offensively, he loves to score, loves to compete, loves to win, and that shows in every aspect of his game from his off-ice training to his on-ice practices to his game,” noted the Tigers’ coach. “If it’s a one-on-one battle drill, he wants the puck. He wants to compete with whatever he does and as a coach, you love to see that. That brings his teammates who compete with him to work even that much harder, so it makes everybody around him better when he competes at that level.”

If there’s one knock against Biraben, it is that he doesn’t possess a plethora of size. At 5-foot-10 and 161 pounds, opponents and skeptics alike may tend to dismiss the Kingston, Ontario native too quickly. For those who take the time to watch Biraben in action, however, they will most likely discover quickly that their dismissive attitudes are ill-founded.

“As far as being smaller, he doesn’t play a small game,” Johnston emphasized. “He’s not shy around the corners. He plays a physical aspect. He doesn’t run around but when hits present themselves, he plays physically, and he battles and he comes out of corners and he wins those battles. As a coach, he has to continue, obviously, to do all those things.”

In addition to his on-ice talent, the soon-to-be-19-year-old is also a leader on and off the ice, earning himself an “A” this season.

“He’s an assistant captain for a reason,” Johnston added. “He leads in the locker room and he’s great with all the players, all of his teammates, and he wants to win and he brings everybody else up to that level of competitiveness. So, when you look at the whole package with what he does, he’s a big reason for the success we’re having. We can be a little bit further up [in the standings] if you look at the big picture, but I am really happy with where the team is at.

“Obviously with Justin, he brings it every game, he competes every game, and there’s consistencies at a high level, and as a player, that’s what you strive for. You can’t have the ups and downs or the good games and the bad games. He consistently has good games. That doesn’t mean he scores every game and doesn’t mean he gets points every game; it just means he’s consistently doing the right things and he’s consistently playing at a high level. That’s what you want and that’s what everybody should aspire to be.”

As the Aurora Tigers prepare for the final few weeks before the holiday break, they will look to win as many games as possible. And with Biraben in the lineup, they are in an ideal position to do exactly that.

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