After an 8-1 win over the Maine Nordiques in game one of the two-game weekend series, the Johnstown Tomahawks looked to do the same in game two.
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two teams gunning for first place in the NAHL East Division, the #1 Johnstown Tomahawks would sweep #2 Maine Nordiques in the two-game series this past weekend. Johnstown took home a victory 7-1, Saturday night in a team effort.
What seemed to be déjà vu, from the first game of the weekend happened early on within the first period. Within the first minute to be exact with Cannon Green scoring and giving the Nordiques an early lead. However, that didn’t seem to scare the Johnstown Tomahawks. A lot of back-and-forth action including a Jay Ahearn penalty giving Maine some power-play time. Halfway through the period, the Tomahawks tied up the Nordiques after an unassisted goal by Will Margel. Less than 20 seconds later Brendan Clark gave the Hawks the lead with his goal assisted by Jay Ahearn and Holt Oliphant. But the Tomahawks weren’t done just yet, with a minute left to go Drew Murphy extended the lead with his rebound goal assisted by Liam Whitehouse and Max Neill. The teams would head into the locker room with the Tomahawks up by two.
Goaltender Josh Graziano has truly been a key asset to the Tomahawk’s success and made impressive saves throughout the game, but especially in the second period. After letting an early goal in the first period, Graziano made stellar saves to stop the Nordiques. There wasn’t much scoring throughout the second period but the goals that made it to the back of the net truly lit a fire in the Tomahawks. At 8:05 Jay Ahearn made it 4-1 in favor of the Tomahawks with his goal assisted by Brendan Clark. With multiple penalty calls in favor of the Nordiques, we saw Johnstown’s lethal penalty kill to go to work. Maine wouldn’t go on to score in the second, but that wasn’t the case for the Tomahawks. Antony Mastromonica with a Caden Lewandowski and Alex Gritz assist put the Hawks up 5-1 going into the third period.
With an early-on penalty from the Maine Nordiques, causing a game misconduct for Aidan Connolly the Tomahawks saw an early-on opportunity to add to the score during the five-minute power play. Drew Murphy was able to take full advantage of the penalty and tallied a power-play goal for his second goal of the night and third on the weekend. A little after 14 minutes into the third period, Holt Oliphant sealed the deal for the Hawks with a goal assisted by John Gelatt and Ryan Poorman. Josh Graziano continued to showcase his talent as a goalie and made impressive and almost impossible saves to secure the 7-1 win for the Tomahawks.
The Tomahawks would remain the number-one seat in the NAHL East Division after outscoring the Nordiques 15-2 on the weekend. The Tomahawks will return home to the 1ST SUMMIT ARENA next weekend to take on the Maryland Black Bears. Get your tickets now online at Ticketmaster or at the Tomahawks office.