Johnstown’s Holt Oliphant scored two goals to help lead the visiting Tomahawks to a 4 – 1 victory over the Titans last night to complete the weekend sweep. This weekend also concluded the eight games between the teams this season with the Titans winning five of them, although they were outscored by a combined margin of 25 to 23.
Johnstown’s David Wilcox opened the scoring at 8:01 of the first period. Tomahawks hero from Friday night’s game Egan Schmitt picked up the loose puck at his own slot and made a long stretch pass off the near side boards to a breaking Stephen Kyrkostas. As Kyrkostas gained the offensive line, he went towards the bottom of the faceoff circle and tried to make a centering pass out front, but it went off a Titans defender. As the puck dropped to the ice, Wilcox took a wrist shot that found its way through a screen and past Titans netminder Andrew Takacs to make it a 1- 0 game.
Oliphant doubled the visitors lead at 6:35 into the middle stanza. Oliphant broke out of his own end and up through the neutral zone where he passed the puck to Schmitt on his left. As Schmitt gained the line, the biscuit was tipped off his stick and it went to the far side boards where it was retrieved by Schmitt. Schmitt wrapped the puck around the end boards to Olipant in the near side corner, and Olipant sent a return pass to Schmitt who was now at the far side boards goal line. Schmitt took a sharp angle shot that was redirected out front by Oliphant and past Takacs for his fifteenth goal of the season.
Zach Murray scored with 4:39 remaining in the second to make it a 3 – 0 game. As a Titans powerplay had just expired, Murray picked up the loose puck at center ice and into the Titans zone. As Murray gained the line on a two-on-one with Johnny Ulicny, Murray took a wrist shot that beat Takacs long side for Murray’s 24th goal of the season.
Johnstown’s David Matousek was called for roughing at 5:59 into the third period. Twelve seconds later Ryan Coughlin put the Titans on the board. After Levente Keresztes won the ensuing faceoff deep inside the Tomahawks zone, the puck went back to David Posma at the near side point. As Posma started to walk the line, he made a shuttle pass to Nick Ring at the top of the slot. As Ring went towards the net, he passed it over to Coughlin on his left and Coughlin took a wrist shot from the far side faceoff circle that beat Johnstown’s goalie Matthew O’Donnell long side for Coughlin’s fifteenth goal of the season.
Oliphant closed out the scoring with an empty net goal with thirty-two seconds remaining in the game.
Takacs stopped 30 of 33 shots while O’Donnell, who played well again between the pipes, turned aside 32 of 33. Click here for the box score.
The Red Buckets have five remaining games in the regular season, three of them at home starting on Wednesday against the Danbury Jr. Hat Tricks at 7:00PM.