Sports
Lumberjacks’ early leads don’t stand up
Matthew Semisch
02/03/2015
With potentially only two weeks left to go this season, Dakota College at Bottineau (DCB) hockey coach Travis Rybchinski would like to see consisistently solid play from his team.
Up to this point, though, that hasn’t happened.
Irregularities were a problem again last weekend for the Lumberjacks when they hosted a two-game set against the junior varsity team from Finlandia (Mich.).
DCB went ahead early in both games but then went on to lose both. The Lions bested DCB 3-2 on Friday night and 3-1 on Saturday afternoon, both at the Bottineau Community Arena.
In both games, the Jacks started out as the better team. First-period goals from Lucas Walsh and Alex Herman gave DCB a 2-0 lead in the series-opener on Friday, while Herman again put the Jacks in front in Saturday’s opening frame.
From those points on in both games, though, Finlandia took over. In both games, the Lions came from behind to score three unanswered goals and pick up a pair of wins over DCB.
Rybchinski suggested a big reason for the Jacks’ struggles last weekend - and much of this season - was an inability to play well for full 60-minute games.
“Same broken record all year,” Rybchinski said. “We’ve been playing well for 15 minutes of a game or 20 but haven’t kept up that level of urgency, and I don’t know why.
“I don’t know if our guys took Finlandia lightly, but they shouldn’t have because Finlandia worked harder than us and deserved to win. It’s just disappointing with two losses, and we didn’t play hard to enough to win either of them.
“Credit goes to Finlandia because they played harder and wanted it more than us,” he continued, “and that’s kind of been the story all year.”
Friday’s series-opener started out particularly well for the Jacks. Walsh beat Lions goaltender Matt McLaughlin 9:56 into the game to give DCB a 1-0 lead before Herman doubled the Jacks’ lead shortly thereafter at 11:06 of the same frame.
Over the game’s final 40 minutes, however, Finlandia took over. The Lions tied the game at 2-2 in the second period on a pair of goals before Tomas Clayton netted the game-winner at 9:05 of the third period.
On Saturday, Herman’s lone goal for DCB 4:22 into the game was canceled out and then some by three goals for the Lions in the second period.
DCB (7-16-0) will take part in a best-of-three NJCAA Region XIII this week against Williston State. The winner will earn a place in this year’s four-team NJCAA playoff finals in Binghamton, N.Y.
The first game of the regional playoff will take place on Friday at Williston’s Agri-Sports Complex at 7 p.m., while Game 2 will take place at the Bottineau Community Arena on Sunday at 7:30 p.m.
A third game, if necessary, would take place in Williston next Tuesday at 7 p.m.