LocalSportsJournal.com
MT. PLEASANT — Limiting the Mt. Pleasant Oilers to fewer than 10 shots on goal for the game, and peppering the Oilers’ net with 32 attempts, the Lakeshore Badgers co-op ice hockey team rolled to a 7-4 victory on the road Wednesday night.
Both teams came into the game with similar records, and evenly matched. Although the Badgers would have prefereed to give up fewere goals, coach Bill Shriver wasn’t about to complain about the win.
The Badgers have actually been scoring a little more frequently lately, but haven’t been able to hang with some of the bigger teams on the schedule because of their short roster.
It was a back-and-forth affair.
Lakeshore took an early 1-0 lead, but the Oilers came back to knot the score at 1-1. The Badgers moved back in front, 2-1, only to see the Oilers answer to make it 2-2.
It would not be tied again, as the Badgers reeled off a string of five unanswered goals and never looked back. The Oilers scored a couple goals before the final horn, but could not catch up to the Badgers.
“We had a lot of shots go in that wouldn’t normally go in, so it was good,” Shriver said. “We knew we would be evenly matched with them, just based on our records.
“It was a good game. It was a good total team game. Three of their four were power play goals. Again, the penalties hurt us. But, we were able to supplement it with goals. Everybody contributed.”
Bear Lake junior Bryce Harless and Mason County Central junior Austin Quillan each had a hat trick for the Badgers. Ludington senior Luke Larr added a goal as well.
Assists were recorded by Ludington junior Rylan Mirretti, Ludington senior Luke Larr (2), Harless (2), Mirretti (3), Ludington senior Sawyer Smith and Mason County Central senior Russell Schade.
The Badgers are scheduled to host Kalamazoo United at the West Shore Community Ice Arena on Friday.
