Tomahawks Fall, 2-1, in Shootout

Jan 4, 2013

Tomahawks Fall, 2-1, in Shootout

By Suzanne Grove

Flint, MI – The Tomahawks fell to the Michigan Warriors Saturday for the second consecutive night, losing, 2-1, in a shootout to the last-place team in the North Division at Perani Arena and Event Centre.

 

Despite a spectacular performance throughout 65 minutes, Johnstown’s goaltender Colin Brennan allowed Michigan to score on three of its four shootout attempts, while the Tomahawks only converted two of their five.

 

Johnstown (17-10-8) is now 2-2-1 against Michigan this season going into the final game of the three-game weekend series, which concludes tomorrow at 4 p.m. The Warriors (12-18-5) have now won four straight games.

 

The game marked the 11th time the Tomahawks have played past regulation this season. Johnstown has won two of its six games that have ended in a shootout.

 

With the score tied, 1-1, in the third period, the Warriors’ Martin Gruse took a penalty for high sticking with less than two minutes remaining, but the Tomahawks were not able to convert the opportunity in regulation. The Tomahawks entered the overtime period with a 39-second man advantage, but neither team could find the net during the five minutes and headed to the shootout.

 

For the second night in a row, the Tomahawks and Warriors were scoreless through the first period.

 

The Tomahawks once again got on the board first at 4:24 of the second period when Andrew McDonald put a shot past Warrior goaltender Trevor Gorsuch’s glove side, making it 1-0.

 

Later in the period, the Warriors took advantage of a power-play opportunity after Jesse Kessler was sent to the penalty box for tripping. Twenty-two seconds after getting the man advantage, Jake Hopfner received a pass from A.J. Marcinek at the top of the right circle and maneuvered around traffic in front of Brennan to score on his backhand, tying the game, 1-1, with 40 seconds remaining in the period.