Bantam Rep, 2016-2017 (Mooretown Minor Hockey)

OMHA Playdowns have begun.  The Mooretown Bantam Rep team is peaking at just the right time.  Mooretown faces Mount Bridges in a preliminary best of 5 series.  The first game took place Monday January 9th.  The Cougar's captain capitalized on opportunities in the first period to score 4 goals.  Hawkins was the Flag to change the team’s momentum by scoring a goal.  From then on it was all Flags’ hockey.

What many anticipated to be a loss started off very well for Mooretown.  First period play saw Mooretown matching the Dragons shots on net.  Dorchester was the first team to appear on the scoreboard.  However, it didn’t take long for the Flags to answer with  Turner finding the five hole assisted by Booth.  Continuing the pressure, Forbes stripped the puck from a defenseman at center ice.  He skated under pressure down to fire a rocket into a quarter size hole top corner.  Dorchester answered with a goal late in the second to tie the game going into the third. 

Mooretown played their best back and forth hockey game to date.  Facing the semi-finalist Ice Dogs, Mooretown generated offense from all directions.  Every player seemed to step up putting shots on net and throwing the body against a huge team.  Lahey rung one off the post, Bogaert set up wingers, Crowley and Peters both had a couple promising rushes.  During a penalty kick Nicholson schooled the opposing team on how to tie the puck up behind the net. 

After playing two stellar back and forth periods, Mooretown was up by two goals.  Scoring was generated by the first and second line.  Between the pipes, Gladwish was thinking “This will be my first shutout of the year!”  All that positive energy came to a swift end.  The Predators managed to tie up the game within two minutes of the puck dropping in the third.  After that Mooretown never seemed to regain their stride in what ended as the toughest loss of the year!  The final scored ended up being 5-2.

Facing the toughest opponent yet, Mooretown knew they would have their hands full.  They boys didn’t disappoint skating full speed at the drop of the puck.  The Lancers had their lowest goal differential during the 1st period with a lead of 2.  Unfortunately, a short bench left the boys unable to keep up the pace.  The second and third period saw the home team Lancers take advantage of having three full lines to score several unanswered goals.