Michael Young recorded his first junior goal and assist while Rocca Testa-Basi had two assists to help lead the Titans to a 3 – 1 win over the visiting Johnstown Tomahawks. The victory enabled the Titans to split this weekend’s two game series between the teams.
Marcus Sang was called for tripping at 2:41 into the game to give the Tomahawks the man advantage. Six seconds later Jack Black scored Johnstown’s long goal of the evening. After the Tomahawks’ Sean Ramsay won the draw at the Titans near side faceoff circle, the puck went back to Dustin Geregach at the point. Geregach took a wrist shot that was blocked out front, but the rebound came right out to Black who turned around and took a shot that beat Andrew Takacs to make it a 1 – 0 game.
Young scored his first junior career goal with 2:58 remaining in the first period to knot the score at one. David Posma intercepted a pass at center ice along the far side wall and entered the offensive zone with Testa-Basi on a two-on-one. As Posma gained the line, he passed it over to a trailing Young who took a shot from the top of the shot that went wide. Following up on the play, Posma, picked up the rebound in the far side corner and made a centering pass out front to Young who beat Tomahawks goalie Sam Evola to tie the game.
Jake LaRusso gave the Titans the lead with 2:45 remaining in the second period. With play inside the Titans zone, Testa-Basi intercepted a Tomahawks pass at the top of far side faceoff circle and passed it over to Young on his left. Young looked and found a breaking LaRusso in the neutral zone and head manned him the puck as LaRusso walked in all alone on Evola and beat the keeper for his third goal of the season.
With twenty-two seconds remaining in the middle stanza, Anthony Calafiore doubled the Titans lead. As Tommy Bannister was tying up a Johnstown player along the end boards in the Tomahawks zone, he was able to pass the puck to Brendan Dumas in the near side corner. As Dumas started to circle towards the slot, he took a wrist shot that was saved by Evola but the rebound came right out to Calafiore on the doorstep and the Staten Island, NY native lifted the puck up and over the fallen netminder and into the open net for his first goal of the season, which also closed out the scoring and make it a 3 – 1 game.
Takacs stopped 23 of 24 shots while Evola turned aside 41 of 44 shots. Click here for the box score.
The Titans now will go on a three-game road swing beginning next weekend with a two-game series in Attleboro, NY against the Northeast Generals, and then they will visit the Danbury Jr. Hat Tricks on Wednesday, October 20 before they return home for a two-game series against the defending East Division champions Maine Nordiques starting October 22.