Sr Pontiacs Glorious at Home against Eckville

The Bonnyville Sr Pontiacs welcome the Eckville Eagles to the RJ Lalonde this weekend for some double header action, which the Pontiacs captured both wins. Saturday’s match in overtime, 6-5 and Sunday in regulation, 5-4. “It was a pretty stressful weekend,” laughs Head Coach for the Sr Pontiacs, Chad Milnthrop reflecting on the close matches.

Saturday

The Eagles opened scoring just over halfway through the first period with a goal from Brendan Lamb. That was followed up by with a goal from  Dakota Mason, fed from Corey Wandler. Which took the team into the second with a tie, soon broken by former NHL’er, Jonathan Kalinski from brother Dillon Kalinski and Troy Dumais. The Eagles took their time responding, waiting until just a minute left in the second for  Kyle Maas to pop in a shorty.

Tied up, once again, fan favourite, Lucas Isley broke the symetry from Allias Kalinsky and Troy Dumais to make it a 3-2 game for Bonnyville. Glory was short-lived as the Eagles’ Brendan Lamb got a pair of goals to advance Eckville and award himself a hat trick. In true senior hockey excitement, the last two minutes of the third were nuts… spinning in a washing machine, all over the place, back and forth. Devon Kalinski tied up the game unassisted, only to be followed with Eckville’s Mitch Labreche breaking the tie… for Michael Desjarlais from Devon Kalinski to tie it again, with 13 seconds left in the game.

51 seconds of extra time was all that was needed for  Troy Dumais to capture the game winner from Lucas Isley and Denis Cadrin.

“We were down in both games, until the last few minutes of the third period. The boys took some bad penalties, we had some hot heads out there… but whatever, we prevailed,” Milnthrop says the heat from Saturday’s game only boiled over into Sunday.

Sunday 

The club was down 4-2 heading into the third period on Sunday, with a pair of goals from Michael Desjarlais. Desjarlais was involved in all the Pontiacs’ goals for the day as he assisted the final three that would win the game in the third period.

First was a power play goal from Denis Cadrin, then a  Lucas Isley and the game winner from  Dakota Mason. Mason grabbed points on all but one of the Bonnyville goals in the game, as well.

The Pontiacs brought up David Rupp, from the St Paul Jr B Canadiens, Milnthrop says the young player performed very well, “he was able to stop more pucks than the other goalie, so that’s always good.”

With one game left in the regular season, the club will be travelling to Westlock. Tied for first in the North Central Sr Men’s Hockey League, Milnthrop says, undoubtedly, the goal is to collect those two points and finish the clear leader. “Hopefully, pull out another W and work on our game for playoffs.”