After a defensive battle through the opening stages of the 1st frame, the Tomahawks struck first with Justin Rapp recording his 16th of the year with just under a minute to go.
The second period opened up in a somewhat similar fashion to the 1st with both teams trading shots on goal and chances. Halfway through the period, Reid Lune found the back of the net for his 11th tally of the season. The play was started by defenseman Justin Gibson with a beautiful stretch pass to lead forward Cade Baker into the zone. Baker made a strong play to the net and simultaneously dropped the puck for Lune who had room to shoot, and he made no mistake.
After taking a commanding lead in the 2nd period, New Jersey answered just 5 minutes later when Ryan Novo recorded his 8th goal of the season.
With 5 minutes to go in the 2nd period, things started to intensify as forward Taybor Aldrich was assessed a 5-minute major penalty and game misconduct for charging into the New Jersey netminder. The netminder Brice, had to leave the game and was replaced by Dylan Krick. With 2 minutes remaining in the period, New Jersey was left with almost 3 minutes of powerplay time remaining and with just 1.2 seconds remaining in the period, New Jersey forward Ryan Friedman tied the game up at 2 heading to intermission.
Tomahawks killed off the remaining New Jersey powerplay time to begin the 3rd period and began to control most of the momentum getting quality shots. Osborne comes up huge just 5 minutes in on a bang-bang play around the net. New Jersey began to swing momentum in their favor in the next couple of minutes getting solid zonetime and possession. Osborne staying strong keeping the score even.
The Tomahawks begin to generate a couple of quality chances but Krick stands tall as well. Both of these teams seem to not want to make any big mistakes with less than 5 to go in the 3rd. With 3 minutes to play defenseman Issac Holt creates an A+ scoring chance but just couldn’t find the back of the net. You could almost feel the tension in 1st Summit Arena in the dying moments of the 3rd period. Heading to OT. Shots are Johnstown 36, New Jersey 32.
The first overtime period is underway, and New Jersey is controlling the action testing Osborne and per usual he’s up to the task. Just about 4 minutes into overtime, New Jersey’s Logan Renkowski scores on a wrister that had eyes that snuck under Osborne’s glove hand. New Jersey wins the marathon first game of the series, 3-2 in overtime.
The Johnstown Tomahawks will face the New Jersey Titans for game two of the opening round of the Robertson Cup playoffs tomorrow night at 7 PM. Skip the box office line and order your tickets now, right here on our website. Can’t make it to the game? Catch all the action live on NAHLTV! As always stay up to date with your Johnstown Tomahawks by following us on our social media handles.