By David Dell
PORT HURON- The Wolves from Watertown, New York met with the Prowlers for the only meeting between the two teams this season on Friday night and got nowhere in the standings after a close loss.
On the last shot of the first period with just 18 seconds remaining, Luke James (4th of the season) tipped home a shot from the point by Bryan Parsons to take a 1-0 lead into the locker room. The Wolves who are in front of the Prowlers by 5 points in the standings started Breandon Colgan, arguably one of the more consistent goalies in the Federal Prospects Hockey League. Watertown was outshot 13-5.
Just 2 ticks past one minute into the second period a pair of backhand shots doubled up the Prowlers score 2-0. Reggie Millete from near the top of the slot, gave a soft backhanded pass to Lukas Lacny (11th of the season) followed suit with a soft backhand flip of his own to beat Colgan in close, with traffic. Jamie Bucell (10th of the season) made it 3-0 at 5:52 when Captain Austin Fetterly got the puck on a face off to the left of Colgan, sent it back to the blue line where Bucell was waiting for the long one-timer that flexed the netting for a sure indication of the score. Following an aggressive Prowler forecheck and offensive chances, Watertown’s Carter Thornton chipped away at Port Huron’s lead with a low shot at 17:15 to put his team on the big board. Watertown would again finish the period with single-digit shots, putting up 8 to 9 for the Prowlers.
Period three saw an odd assessment of penalties resulting in a Watertown powerplay at 9:41. Player Coach Alex Johnson picked up an Interference minor, Luke James a Tripping minor while Andrew Whalen was sent to the locker room with a Fighting major and a game ejection. Playing 4-3 for two minutes gave the Wolves a powerplay goal by Kyle Powell to trim the Port Huron lead by another goal, 3-2. Colgan was pulled with a minute remaining to give Watertown the extra attacker, but they were unable to capitalize and after the play was whistled down on a non-penalty high stick call, he returned for the resulting faceoff in the Wolve’s defensive zone. Port Huron got a shot off that Colgan gloved but kept in play and as he headed to back to the bench Watertown iced the puck so the face off came right back down to his left. Watertown put up a stiffer offensive effort with 16 shots against Port Huron’s 14 but couldn’t steal a point with a tie to end regulation.
The Prowlers move to within 2 points of Watertown trying to avoid the play in format to the playoffs between the 4th and 5th place teams in each division with a solid finish of 3rd place or better. They play a pair of home games Saturday night and Sunday afternoon against the Athens Rock Lobsters out of Georgia. Saturday’s game is the annual Breast Cancer Awareness game with specialty sweaters sponsored in part by Take a Shot at Breast Cancer. The pink and black sweaters will be auctioned off after the game along with sweaters and custom banners, worn by the Prowler Spirit.
The Prowlers play in the Empire Division of the Federal Prospects Hockey League, now in its’ 15th year.
