By Brett Richter:
It’s a long and winding road from Ironwood, Michigan to Dryden, Ontario. With an early Friday morning departure, the Lumberjacks boarded the team bus headed toward Dryden for a weekend series against the league leading Ice Dogs; a team with only five losses this season.
Friday, January 16 – With a 7 pm puck drop, The Lumberjacks took the ice riding momentum after their win the past Saturday. An early penalty by the Lumberjacks put the Ice Dogs on the power play. It only took 40 seconds for their opponent to show the potency of the league leading power play putting the Jacks in an early 0-1 hole. Ironwood’s Jack Hanna tallied his seventh goal of the season on the power play just two minutes later, tying the game 1-1. Hanna’s goal was assisted by Logan Carey and Tyki Babcock. In just less than 4 ½ minutes, the Dogs added three goals to their side of the score board, putting Ironwood down 1-4 with less than four minutes remaining. Another Ice Dog penalty put the Jacks on the power play, and #21 Tyler Cavar scored his first Junior A goal just before the penalty expired. Both Hanna and Babcock added assists on the goal. The period ended 2-4.
With the Lumberjacks power play adding two goals in the first, there was optimism on the Ironwood bench for a resurgence. Just over 13 minutes into the period, another puck slipped past Ironwood net minder Connor Doyle, pushing the score to 2-5. But Dryden took another late period penalty and Ironwood Captain, Will Porter added his 8th goal of the season, a power play goal, with assists credited to Jack Carruthers and Owen DeBrody. The period ended 3-5.
Facing a two-goal deficit, Ironwood took the third period ice with determination. The Jacks started with pressure and disciplined play putting up many of their 17 third period shots on the Dryden goalie. But the Ironwood side of the scoreboard would not change. Dryden added a late third period goal and when the final horn sounded, the Jacks fell 3-6 to the league leading opponent.
Saturday, Jan 17 – Finding positives in a team loss is not always easy. But at the end of last evenings game, the Ironwood Lumberjacks powerplay had finally come to life. Scoring goals on three of the six opportunities the evening before gave head coach Doug Lein lots to build from. In addition, having new names show up on the score sheet started to lead to diversity in the lineup.
But the biggest bug of the season reared its ugly head on Saturday night. For some reason, the Lumberjacks tend to start the game slow and find themselves in an early hole. Playing against the league leading Ice Dogs, giving up a goal only 16 seconds into the opening session was not in the plan. Yet after only 16 seconds, the Jacks found themselves in an early hole, 0-1. An Ironwood penalty put the Ironwood team shorthanded, and the Dogs took advantage building an early 0-2 lead. At the eight-minute mark, #23 Owen DeBrody scored his first Junior A hockey goal with assists from Cavar and Brendan Klotz, cutting the lead in half. Dryden stretched the lead to 1-3 with roughly four minutes left in the period.
The second period started slowly for the Lumberjacks with Ironwood goalkeeper Gavin Covrig having a shot sneak by just two minutes after the start of the period. But assistant captain Jake Scott refused to let the momentum slip away. While on the power play and with a sharp shot from the point, Scott scored his second goal of the season with assists from DeBrody and from #5 Bennet Arro. The next 10 minutes played evenly between the two teams. With two minutes remaining, Ironwood’s Brendan Klotz found himself on a breakaway with #16 Colin Dorsey-Burdick. A perfect pass form Klotz allowed Dorsey-Burdick to bury the shot bringing the Jacks closer as the period ended 3-4 in favor of Dryden.
Ironwood took three penalties in the first fifteen minutes of the third allowing the Dogs to tally two powerplay goals increasing their lead to three goals. At the 17:33 minute of the third, frustration boiled over on the ice with three of the Lumberjacks and three of the Ice Dogs receiving penalties – a total of 20 penalties equating to 46 minutes. The game ended with a duplicate 3-6 score, mirroring the night before.
The Ironwood Lumberjacks are at home Friday and Saturday, January 23 and 24 at the Ironwood Civic Center. Puck drops at 7 PM both nights.