Newcomer Billy Feczko had a goal and three assists in his Titans debut and six other Red Buckets hit the twine to lead the Titans to a 7 – 2 win over the visiting Northeast Generals.
The Titans scored early and often starting a 3:21 of the first period when Rocco Testa-Basi scored his ninth goal of the season to open the scoring. Owen Luik picked up the loose puck at the Generals near side half wall and passed it over to Blake Farrell on his right at the top of the slot. Farrell took a clapper that went high and wide of the net and it caromed off the backboards to the right of the Northeast net where Testa-Basi tapped the biscuit past Generals’ goalie Cullen DeYoung short side to make it a 1 – 0 game.
Tommy Bannister doubled the Titans lead midway through the period. Eric Charpentier started the play at his own far side faceoff dot and made a cross-ice pass to Brendan Dumas breaking up the boards. As Dumas gained the line, he made a dangle move around Northeast defenseman Steven Ardagna and he passed the puck to Feczko breaking towards the net. Feczko sent a return pass to Dumas in the slot. Dumas sent the biscuit through the goalmouth to Bannister, and the Titans assistant captain redirected the puck past DeYoung for his team high seventeenth goal of the season.
New Jersey then scored four goals in the middle stanza to blow open the game. Michael Young made it 3 – 0 at 3:26 into the second. As soon as a Titans penalty expired, Young picked up the loose puck at center ice and walked in all along on DeYoung and backhanded the biscuit past the Generals’ netminder for his eighth goal of the season.
Anthony Mollica made it 4 – 0 at 5:16 of the period. With the puck in the Northeast zone, the Generals’ Joe Schubert brought the puck up behind his own net to the slot where he was knocked off the biscuit by Feczko. As Schubert was falling the puck went to Mollica who took a clapper that beat DeYoung for fifth goal of the season.
DeYoung was replaced by Oliver Drum.
Forty-two seconds after Mollica scored, Colin Grable gave the Titans a 5 – 0 lead. Playing four-on-four hockey, Luik brought the puck up the near side boards and made a cross-ice pass to Anthony Calafiore. As Calafiore gained the line, he made a shuttle pass up to Grable in the slot and the Spring Lake, NJ native took a shot that caught Drum by surprised and beat him short side for Grable’s fourth goal of the season.
Levente Keresztes eighth goal of the season made it 6 – 0 with two minutes remaining in the second.
Northeast’s Sixten Jennersjö scored two minutes into the final period to break the shutout bid. Feczko scored his first goal as a Titan at 7:32 of the third to give the Red Buckets a 7 – 1 lead, and then the Generals’ Evan Orr scored a powerplay goal midway through the final period to close out the scoring and make it a 7 – 2 game.
Andrew Takacs stopped 23 of 25 shots in the win while DeYoung and Drum combined to turn aside 43 of 50 shots. Click here for the box score.
The teams will close out their weekend series tonight at 7:00PM at the Middletown Sports Complex.