Senior captain Bryan Lerg takes the puck into the Laker’s half of the arena in the first period of the Spartans’ match-up against the Lake Superior Lakers held at the Taffy Able Arena Friday evening. The result was a Spartan victory and a final score of 3-2.
Sault Ste. Marie — The No. 5 MSU hockey team got back to basics Friday night against Lake Superior.
In what head coach Rick Comley called a “hard-fought game,” the Spartans scored three times in the first 24 minutes and held off a late rally to secure a 3-2 win over the Lakers at Taffy Abel Arena.
“We haven’t had a win in four games and these are the games we had to have no matter how we got it done,” senior captain Bryan Lerg said.
MSU’s power play, which has struggled the past two weeks, came to play in the first period, taking advantage of two of the three opportunities it was presented.
Lerg started things off with his sixth goal of the season and senior forward Chris Mueller followed that with a goal of his own with just eight seconds left in the period.
“Coach wanted our power play to start clicking and it started clicking,” Lerg said. “We just got after it.”
Junior forward Nick Sucharski made it 3-0 early in the second period, taking the shot on a 2-on-1 break and beating Lake Superior goaltender Brian Mahoney-Wilson.
“The goalie was cheating a lot,” Sucharski said. “He thought the pass was coming and I hit the middle bar. You take what you get.”
The Lakers got one back at the 10:39 mark when Nathan Perkovich scored his team-leading eighth goal of the season.
MSU held off Lake Superior for much of the third period until freshman forward Dustin Gazley was ejected midway through the third period for checking from behind. He was also assessed a game disqualification and will miss tomorrow’s game as well.
Down two goals, the 5-minute power play was a golden opportunity for Lake Superior to climb back into the game.
MSU would have none of it.
The Lakers couldn’‘t even muster a shot during the first half of the power play as they were held off by an MSU penalty kill that was bringing pressure and blocking shots — MSU blocked 10 in the period.
“That was a big effort, for sure,” Comley said.
Said Lerg: “We showed some character there killing it off, a lot of hard work and it had to get done.”
Unable to convert, things looked grim for Lake Superior until it got on the board with 19 seconds left on a goal by Rick Schofield.
Lake Superior head coach Jim Roque called timeout after the goal and a mad pursuit followed, but the Spartans were able to clear the zone and hang on for a 3-2 win.
Junior goaltender Jeff Lerg stopped 25 shots for the Spartans while Mahoney-Wilson made 19 saves for the Lakers.
The two teams meet again at 7:05 p.m. Saturday.
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