– A three-goal outburst in the back half of the second period helped send the Blind River Beavers on their way to a 5-2 victory over the Powassan Voodoos Friday in a Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League inter-divisional meeting at the Blind River Community Centre.
After some travel issues for the Voodoos resulted in a late start to the contest, the Beavers scored first, six and a half minutes in, as they pressured the puck free in the corner and worked it out to Jack Robinson, who put a shot past netminder Daniel Dirracolo from the left side.
Tying it halfway through the opening frame, Powassan’s Cameron Lemcke blocked a shot and moved down the right wing and went to the net where an attempt on target hit off a Blind River defender and right back to him, where he had an open net to deposit the equalizer past Iain Wintle in the home side’s net.
The visiting Voodoos took the lead just over four minutes into the second stanza as Lemcke picked up another after banging in a point shot from Ethan Seibert that hit off the end boards and came out the other side right to him, where he fired it in.
The Beavers got that back past the halfway point of the proceedings as Evan Fraccaro fired one home from the left circle off a feed from behind the goal line courtesy of Bryce Burnett on a delayed penalty.
Regaining the edge while shorthanded, Jakob Kovacs was ruled to have scored by the officials after the fact, following consultations by the officials off a rising shot that was not initially ruled to have gone in, that did however see the red light go on off the man-down attempt at 14:18.
Capping off the late outburst, Anthony Kalo’s first in the NOJHL, coming in the final minute, had him regain his own attempt, then move in from the left point where he whipped one upstairs over the blocker of a screened Powassan goaltender.
In the third, some quality netminding at both ends kept the score the same, until Blind River’s Josh Thompson iced it with a late empty net effort to wrap up the scoring.
The win sees the Beavers raise their record to 4-1 while the Voodoos suffered their initial setback in regulation, dropping to 2-1-0-1.
The Voodoos continue a busy weekend with a trip across the border to face the Soo Eagles Saturday night.
