sports

PIRATES PICK UP KEY 4-1 WIN OVER LAKE OF THE WOODS

February 7, 2020

Four different Pirates scored goals as the Crookston Pirates Boys Hockey team defeated the Lake of the Woods Bears 4-1 in a Section 8A game played at the Crookston Sports Center.

The Pirates opened the game with two powerplays in the opening six minutes of the game but were unable to produce much on offense. However, as the period wore on Pirates got stronger and stronger before taking a 1-0 with 6:08 to play in the period when Ben Andringa won a faceoff back to Noah Kiel who sent a puck fluttering past the stick side of Bears goaltender Aiden Tom. The Pirates would make it 2-0 when the Bears turned over a puck at the Pirate blue line while on the powerplay. Jack Doda picked up the loose puck on the turnover racing up ice on a breakaway. Doda would fake a forehand shot which the goaltender bit on, taking him down to the ice and Doda flipped a backhander into the net for his team-leading 17th goal of the season and a team-leading fourth shorthanded goal with 2:01 to go in the first. The Pirates continued to apply pressure heading into the break and outshot the Bears 14-2 in the first period.

The Pirates continued to play good hockey throughout the second period but Lake of the Woods was able to put some pressure on Pirate goaltender Noah Dragseth during select shifts. The Bears put seven shots on goal in the period while going 0-for-2 on the powerplay while being outshot by the Pirates 19-7. The Pirates would get the lone goal of the period with 4:08 to go when Jack Doda passed from his knees behind the goal to Quinn Westlake between the hash marks who one-timed his shot into the back of the net for a 3-0 lead. The Pirates ended the period on a powerplay that would carry over to the third period.

Lake of the Woods would turn the tide of the game in the third period as they came out firing and put plenty of pressure on the Pirates over the final seventeen minutes of the game. The Pirates would weather the initial storm and they looked poised to put the game away when they went on the powerplay with 11:31 to play. But the Bears would block a shot and Jack Wood carried the puck up ice before ripping a wrist shot just inside the blue line that went bar down into the net for a shorthanded goal to make it 3-1 with 10:30 to play. The Pirates got stronger as the period progressed and held Lake of the Woods without a shot on goal for the final five minutes of the game despite the Bears playing most of that time with an extra skater and an empty net. Leyton Salentine would ice the game when he skated out of his own end a fired a shot from the Pirate logo at center ice into the empty net for a 4-1 lead with 32 seconds to play. Lake of the Woods outshot the Pirates 16-8 in the third period.

The Pirates improve to 3-19 and will host International Falls Saturday at 3:00 p.m. Lake of the Woods falls to 6-16.