CRANBERRY TWP — A number of limited edition hockey sticks stolen from Cranberry Dek Hockey on May 22 were found over the weekend on a man’s front porch with a note asking that they be returned to the facility.

Sgt. Chuck Mascellino of the township police said the sticks were stolen from the business on Rowan Road sometime on Friday night.

“There was a break-in; a number of sticks were taken,” Mascellino said. “They’re not cheap.”

John Balawejder, the owner of the business, said he posted information about the crime on his Facebook page, asking that the sticks be returned and no charges would be filed.

He said the 28 sticks taken are worth more than $7,000.

Twenty-two of those sticks were returned after his post on Facebook.

But six are still missing.

“They put duct tape on the sticks and dropped them off with a sign on them on the neighbor’s yard,” he said.

Balawejder called most of the sticks “one-of-a-kind” items, noting that they came from the Pittsburgh Penguins.

The Penguins after every season have a surplus of sticks that go unused and are then sold to exclusive retailers. Two of the sticks stolen were used in games, he said.

“We buy directly from the Penguins, and we’re pretty much the only people around who do that,” he said. “They were one-of-a-kind type items.”

Balawejder said this is the first break-in he’s had at the business.