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League News
Antigonish clinches first in Rowe - Still exceptionally tight in Fox
Bulldogs clinch 1st place in Rowe Division…….Pens now 2 back of Colts in race for 1st in Fox……Blues battle Jr. Miners hard….The following is a run down of Nova Scotia Junior Hockey League Action Friday, Feb 17/23.
Antigonish 7 Eskasoni Jr. Eagles 2
The Bulldogs moved ten points ahead of the Jr. Eagles with Eskasoni having only 4 games remaining in their regular schedule as they clinched 1st place in the Sid Rowe Division of the Nova Scotia Junior Hockey League. The Jr. Bulldogs took period leads of 2-0 and 4-0 on goals from sharpshooter Zachary Lorette, Logan McGrath, Will Fitzsimmons and and Owen Flemming in the 2nd. In the third, the Jr. Eagles Sonny Kabatay continued his domination of the league scoring race as he scored his 35th goal of the season and assisted on the other Eskasoni goal to give him 41 assists and 76 points on the season. Kabatay’s goal came 17 seconds into the third period and put Eskasoni behind 4-1 but the teams managed 4 goals in the final 6:47 of the contest with Darren Waterman scoring twice and Will Fitzsimmons adding his second goal of the game to g along with an assist. Alex Christmas scored the Jr. Eagles 2nd goal. Antigonish is now 23-3-1 for 47 points with three games left in their regular season while Eskasoni is 18-7-1 for 37 points and they have four regular season games remaining.
East Hants 4 Capstone 3
The Penguins jumped out quickly and secure themselves a 3-0 lead after one period but as we have found many times throughout this great 22-23 NSJHL Season, huge leads don’t always hold up. Such was the case for the Pens Friday night in Lantz as following the first period goals by the Pens Morgan Lake, Nick Veinot and Sean Freeman, all coming in the last 7 minutes of the first, the Pens knew they couldn’t take anything to the bank as the Colts rallied for a pair in the second period from Tyler Puma and Will MacRae and the Colts went to the dressing room after forty minutes down by a single goal. 6:51 into the third period, Griffin Peers tied the game at 3-3 for the Colts who at this point knew they would be leaving Lantz either 6 points in front in the Fred Fox Division or by 2 points or 5 points. Sean Freeman with his second of the evening scored with 7:15 remaining and the Pens secured a 4-3 win and moved to within 2 points of first place in the Fred Fox Division with a record of 19-4-3 while the Colts are 21-4-1 for 43 points. These same two clubs will be back at it tonight in Lantz as they play a make-up game. After tonight, each team will have three regular season games each to decide first place.
Membertou 4 Cumberland County 2
The Jr. Miners made the trip to Springhill knowing they had to have two wins to keep their playoffs hopes alive. They will play their 30th and final regular season game in Springhill Saturday afternoon in hopes their final game of the regular season might be a little easier than Friday night’s game when despite firing 60 shots at Blues goaltender Ryan Weitzel, they managed only 4 goals and trailed 1-0 after the first and were tied 2-2 after forty minutes with the 2-23-1 Blues. Thie third period was the decisive period for the Jr. Miners as Andrew McCarron scored his 2nd of the game and Landon Clark added an insurance marker to give the 11-14-4 Jr. Miners a 4-2 win. Blake Cox with his 24th of the season as the Membertou goal scorer while Burke Beed and Zachery Gould tallied for the Blues. The Jr. Miners now hold onto the fourth and final playoff position in the Rowe Division, but a lot will depend on today’s game with Cumberland and the make-up games to be played by the Pictou County Scotians as the season winds to a close Sunday Feb 26.