Photos: Northern Lights Photography
HEARST, Ont. – Chase Thompson tallied twice Friday, including collecting the eventual game-winner, as part of an 8-5 victory by the Hearst Lumberjacks over the Timmins Rock in a Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League encounter at Claude Larose Recreation Centre.
The triumph sees the Lumberjacks win for a fourth straight outing, while the Rock saw a nine-game winning streak come to an end.
Connecting first, Hearst opened the scoring 11 and a half minutes into the contest when Aidan Kalin redirected in a Julian Trudel sizzler from the high slot.
Timmins answered with an equalizer at 14:10 thanks to Kaeden McArthur, who took a feed from Reece Liu on a two-on-one, and while coming down the left side ripped a shot past the blocker of netminder Alexandre Boivin.
The Lumberjacks came back to take the lead on a man advantage that saw Thompson convert by banging in a loose puck on Rock starter Graham Gee, off a Kalin blast.
Going up by a pair early in the middle frame, Bronson Babyak won a draw back to defenceman Adam Shillinglaw who moved to the middle and fired an attempt past Gee.
Coming out of their own zone, Hearst made it 4-1 when DonHeaven Veilleux’s nice cross-ice feed found Sam Taylor moving down the slot and saw him snap in his first NOJHL goal, through a partial screen.
Converting on a power play at 16:16, Timmins’ Lucas Lowe neatly redirected in a Liu pass to pull the visitors to within two.
However, the hosts got that back just before the session came to a close as Mathieu Comeau slammed in a rebound off a Shillinglaw shot with seven seconds remaining.
A goal-filled final frame saw each side strike three times to cap-off the high-scoring the affair.
Thompson off a Rock turnover made it 6-2, only to see the Rock’s Thomas Beard click while up a skater, by chipping in a Lowe feed.
Kalin then reenacted the play of his initial marker, by tipping in a Trudel attempt midway through the period.
After Hearst’s Tyler Patterson put the game out of reach, by finishing off a nice set-up from Henry Ouellet, Timmins tacked on a pair of late markers off the sticks of Ryan Armitage, generated by the hard work of Lowe, and Travis Poan, who buried an Alexis Tremblay pass, to wrap things up.
With the result, the Lumberjacks improve to 20-6-0-1 on the season and with the loss, the Rock fall to 19-8-0-0.
