TIMMINS, Ont. – Striking with a pair of third period tallies, the Hearst Lumberjacks came back to edge the Timmins Rock 5-4 in a chippy Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League affair Friday at McIntyre Arena.
The visiting Lumberjacks jumped out to an early lead when Theo Bourdon-Lemoyne tallied for a fourth straight outing as he took a Dylan Westmann pass and split the Rock defence before going in and lifting his chance over the glove of goalkeeper Ayden Mullen.
Making quick work on a power play opportunity later in the first period, Timmins’ Maxx Hamelin slid in the back door and promptly pumped in a crisp pass from down low off the stick of Ashton Beriana for his ninth of the season.
The goal sees Hamelin extend a point streak to current league-high seven games.
More from the home side moments later featured Simon Toupin redirecting a Nolan Chabot point shot by Hearst netminder Jack Helkie while parked between the circles.
Moving to the middle frame, special teams saw the clubs trade extra-man efforts to make it 3-2 Rock.
Edan Etheridge put Timmins up by two at 8:11 when he whipped a shot upstairs over the shoulder of Helkie on a five-on-three.
Getting that back while up a skater themselves, Luc Warner clicked off a face off as he snapped one over the glove of Mullen from the right side.
The Rock’s Evan Katic then joined Hamelin on a seven-game heater when he found the range for his side’s third power play marker of the evening as he finished off a chance after Paradiso kept the puck onside off a Jacks’ clearing attempt.
Inching closer once more, Warner potted his second of the session when he motored down the left side with pace before driving hard to the crease and tucking in a play at 17:14 to cap off a penalty-filled session.
Pulling even at 11:59 of the third, Cameron Menard made it 4-4 when the veteran forward Cameron Menard picked the top right hand corner off a face off win by Owen Kahl.
Hearst then made it 5-4 a couple of shifts later when Terence Levasseur put a shot through a crowd with 5:47 to go, that proved to be the game-winner.
Some late pressure by Timmins saw them press to tie it, but a last-ditch attempt that went in was ruled to have happened after the final buzzer had sounded to give Hearst the narrow victory.
With the result, the Lumberjacks improve to 5-5-0-0 on the season while the Rock fell to 6-3-0-1.
The two teams will cap-off a weekend home-and-home Saturday in Hearst at 7 p.m. and on FLOHockey.tv.
Game Photos:
Thomas Perry – The Daily Press/Postmedia Network
