March 17th

Standings after March 17th Games:

1.       Knights 18 (93-36)

2.       Yeti 16 (83-31)

3.       Eagles 12 (68-37)

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4.       Colonials 8 (63-57)

5.       Bear Claw 8 (75-81)

6.       Hounds 4 (47-123)

7.       Walkers 1 (40-99)

Top 3 will get a bye on the opening night of the playoffs.  The bottom 4 will play in a 4th place tournament (4 vs 7, 5 vs 6, then the two winners playing in an elimination game for the last playoff spot)  2nd seed plays 3rd seed in a best of 3 series, with the 1st seed taking on the 4th place tournament winner in a best of 3 series.*

Knights 7  Yeti 5

The Knights remain unbeaten after a come-from-behind 7-5 victory over the Yeti on Monday night.  This was the second time these Titans met this season with the Knights taking the first game on opening night as well.  

The teams traded jabs in the first period with the Yeti taking a 4-3 advantage into the second period.  After sustaining most of the pressure early in the second period, Braxton McKinley took a nice feed from Ben Rossi to give the Yeti a two-goal lead halfway through the game. 

It was all Knights from there.  Brandon Reiter's powerplay goal late in the third period got the Knights within a goal.  They would score three more in the third to pull away.  Nate Galentine got the tying marker when he was in the right place at the right time to deposit a wayward back-wall shot from Jason Stamler.  Reiter's third goal of the game was a beauty as he lifted it over Adam McKinley's shoulder from close in to put the Knights ahead for the first time with about 6 minute to go in the game.  Noah Kline added an insurance marker off a nice feed from Andy Calvert a couple minutes later to put the game on ice.

After a shaky first period, Clint Lingenfelter was rock solid in net.  The Yeti pushed hard in the first half of the game but may have got tired at the end.  Cody Schuckers was back in the lineup but Zach Smith was a scratch.  Cory Schuckers missed the game as well.  

The two teams will square off one more time in the regular season on March 31st.  Both teams are hoping to secure the 1 seed to avoid a playoff match-up against the Eagles, who seem to be the only team that could threaten either team's championship run.

Eagles 8  Colonials 4

The Eagles broke open a close game in the 3rd period to help snap their 3 game losing streak.  Each goalie, Adam for the Eagles and Clint for the Colonials, were playing their 2nd consecutive game.  Henry has not been available as much this season with other obligations but Adam has done his part in giving the Eagles a chance to win, even in their two losses to the Knights.  Clint continues to play well no matter who he plays for, but the colonials have been a little offensively challenged in their bigger games this season with last night being no different.  They haven’t had been able to get a consistent lineup this season.  Jay Edmiston was back last night and scored 2 goals, but Phil Mace was not able to make it, which left the team scrambling more for offense.  In last week’s loss to the yeti, Phil was present but Jay was not.  Clint played in net so John Matchock could skate out to give the team an extra skater and they were able to keep the game close until the 3rd period.  While the Eagles had not won a game for almost a month, they appear to be going in a good direction as the season winds down.  They used a good balance of scoring, good passing and good defense to pull away in last nights win.  Josh Clontz got the scoring started for them last night about 9 minutes into the game to give his team a 1-0 lead.  They never trailed in this one and went up 2-0 at the end of the first period on a goal from Zac Gray in front of the net.  The Colonials got on the board with Jay Edmiston scoring early in the 2nd period to close the gap to 2-1 but the Eagles went up 3-1 on a nice goal in front of the net from Eric Llewellyn.  Bob and Jay kept the Colonials in the game, drawing them to within a goal at 4-3 late in the 2nd period before the Eagles scored again to go up 5-3 after 2 periods.  Jerred Amick’s goal midway thru the 3rd period made it 7-3 and put the game out of reach.  Alex Waddell and Austin Boyd each had goals in this game for the Eagles as well.  It was a well rounded effort for a team that looks to be going in a good direction, but can they overcome the two teams ahead of them in the standings as the playoffs approach?  It looks like they will be the 3rd seed which will set up a best of 3 against the yeti again in the semi final round.  The yeti can still get the top seed but its most likely going to be the knights considering they have beaten the yeti twice this season.  For the colonials, they just want to get their full squad there for a game or two before the playoffs begin.  They will go up against the bear claw next week in what could be a play in game preview.  Each team is tied with 8 points in the regular season standings and will most likely be playing in the 4th place tournament.  The Eagles will get a 3rd shot at beating the knights when they go up against one another next week.

Hounds 8  Bear Claw 7

The Hounds used a big first period and made the most of their 3 fill ins by going up 6-0 at the end of the first period in this game.  Jason Stamler filled in for the Hounds and made the most of the opportunity by scoring multiple goals in this game to keep the Hounds comfortably ahead until the Bear Claw almost came back in the 3rd period.  Tony Dodd filled in for a missing Chris Snyder and made it hard for the Bear Claw to score in the first 2 periods.   He turned down some good scoring opportunities.  Laken Dodd scored 3, third period goals for the Bear Claw to draw them to within a goal at 8-7, but that’s as close as they would get.  Jaron Buffone scored early in the first period to give the Hounds a 1-0 lead and they never looked back. Cody Haag also added some scoring to keep them ahead.  The Bear Claw were able to keep Noah from getting too involved offensively but did not have much answer for Jason Stamler.  Zach Foradori and Anthony Schuckers had some goals to complement Laken’s 3 goals, with Anthony’s goal coming on a power play.  The Hounds were missing Tyler Waltman, Andrew Britton, Corey Bassett and Chris Snyder.   With the current standings, in particular, the bottom 4 teams, this game did not mean as much with the top 3 spots being pretty well determined, but we will have to avoid skaters from other teams filling in when the playoffs begin.  We tried to get some other people to skate out for them last night instead of Noah and Jay but none were available to stay and we did not want to see a forfeit.  We will need to get more people to help with reffing as the playoffs get closer.  We had to ask Laken and Braxton to ref the Colonial/Eagles game last night due to having no other options.