It was a true rumble at the rink on Friday night under the lights of the their home arena as the Midget ‘A’ Lakers faced off against the Rocky Mountain Royals.
The Royals, currently placed first in the league had a hot night leaving the close behind in second Lakers unable to find mesh in the top seated teams mash up.
Royals goalie, Jeremy Pohl, proved his worth during the game stopping all 28 of the shots made on goal with Lakers goalie Austin Nesbitt only letting two of the 31 shots on goal past the poles.
“There’s not much you can do on a night when a goalie is on fire like that - just keep trying to hit some mesh on a night when all you’re hitting is chest pad,” said Lakers head coach, Mike Nesbitt. “We threw everything at the goalie, we tried everything we could but couldn’t beat them. Our goalie played well and it was a good hockey game - it could have went either way.”
Nesbitt said the team is going to work on not slapping the puck away along with taking possession of the puck and executing their plays stronger.
With the Royals pegging one point in both the first and second periods, the Lakers tried tirelessly to catch up in the third. Eventually in the latter half of the third the crowd watched as the Lakers attempted to capitalize on a power play by pulling their goalie.
“The decision to pull the goalie landed us with a 6-4 advantage because we were on a power play, it was that last shot at getting a goal and they skated until the very last second trying to maybe even get a tie,” said Coach Nesbitt.
Tonight, Thursday Jan. 21 at 8 p.m. the Lakers are up for redemption against the Royals who Nesbitt adds they have been back and forth with all season. Tonight’s game at the NexSource Centre marks the opening game in the provincial qualifying series against the Royals.
“Come support the Lakers and let’s show them all the support we can,” said Nesbitt.
editor@sylvanlakenews.com