OT Win in Pittsburgh, the boys in Gold find another way to win in Steel City!!!
The Piedmont Predators Bantam AA went to the Pittsburgh Mid-Winter Classic with high hopes to win their third out of four “My Hockey Tournaments”Classic of the 2013-14 Season.
The Predators AA faced right off the bat vs. Amherst Knights, the highest ranked Team in the Tourney. After a slow start giving up two goals in the first seven minutes of the game, Jason Rose single handedly changed the momentum of the game by scoring two goals in 6 seconds… Those two goals woke up the Predators AA bench and opened up the scoring flood gates as Nate Shellberg went on a two goals scoring streak followed by a nice goal from Scott Oakman and Sam Morris. This outburst of offense proved to be too much for the Amherst knights and the final score was a 6-4 win.
The second game was another tight game vs. Steel City Renegades. This one was a low scoring affair that saw The Predators win 2-1 on another great effort by Dawson Black and the game winning goal by Jason Rose who displayed his top weekend form.
Third game of the weekend and in a span of 18 hours was a difficult 5-5 tie vs. The Northwest Chargers from Chicago. The Predators saw a 5-2 lead melt in the third period and looked very tired. Jason Rose contributed again in the goal scoring department with a goal and two assists.
After a night of rest and a bitter taste in their mouths, the Predators AA Team went to the rink seeded 1 for the semi-finals and would face The Houston Wild who had looked great all weekend. Not wasting any time and still bitter from last night the boys in blue went on the charge and outshot the Wild 35 to 8 and took a convincing 4-2 win that would have been worse if the Wild goalie would have not stood up on his head to make spectacular save.
Couple hours later, the Predators were ready to face off again vs. The Knights for the ultimate prize. The Knights came out strong as they wanted to revenge their only loss in the Tournament. They would open the score in the first minute by a goal from their top player Greg Koutsomitis. Down early it was going to be an “up-hill” battle from the boys wearing their “Lucky Gold” outfit.
Anthony Blakley was “Johnny on the spot” when he found a rebound shot from Sam Morris laying in the crease and scored a patented Blakley goal out of shear perseverance. The game stayed as a stalemate throughout the rest of regular time and had to go to Overtime to be settled.
Four on four OT was what the boys in gold needed with open space and more chance to come. It finally with less than a minute to play in OT that Dawson Black had a beautiful point shot finding the back of the net.
An explosion of joy ensued, helmets and gloves flying. The boys did it, the boys did it again.
James Lang turned away 29 shots in the championship game after allowing a goal on the first shot…
Well done boys, well done..