Tough opener for Yellowjackets

Joey Massingham

Box Score

St. Scholastica 5, Yellowjackets 1
Box Score

Murphy's Law states that whatever can go wrong will in fact go wrong. For the Yellowjacket men's hockey team, that was indeed the case on Friday night at Wessman Arena as they opened the 2012-13 season. The evening got off to an ominous beginning when public address announcer Mark Fleischer had microphone issues while introducing the starting lineups. Things went down hill from there, as the Yellowjackets never found a way to get on track and dropped the season's first game, 5-1 to Twin Ports rival St. Scholastica.

It was a night where neither team could establish any flow or sustained forecheck, most likely due to the constant parade of players to the penalty box. The two teams combined for 26 penalties for 104 minutes. Both teams had multiple 5-on-3 opportunities, and each team was called for two five-minute majors and had two players thrown out of the game. Yellowjacket freshman Brett Wold (Westlock, Alberta/R.F. Staples), who took a five-minute penalty as time expired was also assessed a game disqualification penalty, making him ineligible for the rematch on Saturday.

The Saints wasted little time opening the scoring for the new season, as freshman Dylan Nowakowski picked up a rebound near the top of the crease and poked it past Yellowjacket goaltender Dennis Nordmark (Vasteras, Sweden/Widenska Sports College) to make it 1-0 just 1:13 into the game. The lead went to 2-0 a few minutes later. Tyler Miller fed a perfect pass to Brett Corcoran in the left circle who one-timed it past Nordmark for a power play goal at 10:40.

Another power play goal early in the second period stretched the Yellowjacket deficit to 3-0. This time Brendan Kotyk took a feed from the left boards and let a wrist shot go from between the circles that beat Nordmark on the stick side. The Yellowjackets finally broke through at the 7:40 mark of the second period on the power play. Pat Dalbec (Superior, Wis./Superior Senior) took a shot from the right point that was deflected home by Joey Massingham (Duncan, British Columbia/Cowichan Secondary) to make it 3-1. Massingham's first goal also drew an assist from Derek Stauber (Duluth, Minn./Marshall School).

The Saints put the game on ice in the third with a pair of late goals. Alex Valenti split the defense and went in alone on Nordmark, beating him with a backhand to make it 4-1 at 15:54. Valenti would add an empty net goal with 27.7 seconds to play to make the final margin 5-1.

Nordmark got the start in place of the injured Drew Strandberg (Thunder Bay, Ontario/Westgate CV&I) and finished up with 16 saves. At the other end Colin Rundell started for the Saints and made 17 saves to pick up the win. He left the game with 5:17 to play in the second period with leg cramps. He was replaced by Tyler Bruggeman who made 10 stops.

On the power play the Yellowjackets went 1-8, while the Saints went 2-6.

The Yellowjackets (0-1-0, 0-1-0 NCHA) will look to rebound in game two of the opening weekend series. Game time from Wessman Arena on Saturday, October 27 is scheduled for 7:05 p.m. and can be heard live locally on 91.3 FM KUWS beginning with the pre-game show at 6:45 p.m. If you are outside the local listening area you can tune into the free audio stream of the broadcast at www.ifan.tv. A pay-per-view video stream of the broadcast is available through UW-Superior's online partner AmericaOne. Jon Garver will have the call.

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