TIMMINS, Ont. – Tied in the Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League standings entering the contest, the surging Hearst Lumberjacks moved past the Timmins Rock Tuesday evening following the match-up after defeating them 3-2 at McIntyre Arena.
Continuing to produce offensively, Hearst’s Jake Desando picked up the lone tally of the opening 20 minutes as his team-leading 23rd gave the guests the lead heading to the intermission.
Heading to the middle stanza, Timmins connected quickly to level the proceedings on Josh Anderson’s eighth 86 seconds into the session.
Going to the power play midway through the period, the Rock went in front thanks to Gage Tremblay, who also scored for an eighth time in 2018-19.
A late strike saw the Lumberjacks tie before time expired as Max Griffioen notched his 20th of the campaign to knot the affair at 2-2 after two.
It stayed tied until the later stages of the third when Hearst struck shorthanded to secure the road victory as Justin Miron put in the game-winner with 3:44 remaining in regulation.
Lumberjacks’ netminder Nicholas Tallarico did the rest finishing with 29 stops on the night to record his club’s fifth straight win.
Tyler Masternak meanwhile in the Timmins net faced 30 shots in defeat.
With the result, Hearst moves two points ahead of the Rock into sole possession of third place in the NOJHL East standings reaching 51 points overall and raising their record to 23-14-4-1 while Timmins slipped 23-15-3-0.
Game Photos courtesy of Thomas Perry, The Daily Press (Timmins)