The Beaver Valley Nitehawks picked up five of a possible six points in a three-games in three-days weekend.
Following a 6-2 victory over Castlegar on Friday and a 5-1 drubbing of the Grand Forks Border Bruins in Grand Forks onSaturday, a shorthanded Beaver Valley Nitehawks team suffered a 4-3 overtime loss to the Bruins at the Hawks Nest onSunday.
“I think we let them into the game and they stole a point off us,” said Hawks coach and GM Terry Jones. “But I think we justlook at it as a learning experience, we made some mistakes, and I think most of those mistakes were made out of fatigue.”
A controversial cross-checking penalty to Evan Gorman at 3:09 of the first OT gave the Bruins the opportunity they wereseeking. Alexander Leonidas slid a pass back to pointman Jordan Roberts who fired a shot that went wide and bounced offthe back boards right to Chad Grambo at the far post, and the Birch Hills, Sask. native banged home the winner past asprawling Tallon Kramer with 2:30 to play.
The Nitehawks were missing captain Sam Swanson, Blake Sidoni, Mitch Foyle, and Dylan Ghiradosi on Sunday and went intothe game with only 15 skaters. But after Nolan Percival (fighting) and defenceman Dylan Kent (hit from behind) were ejectedin the first period in separate incidents, and Jake Yuris left the game with injury, the team started the third period with justover two lines going.
“Guys were tired today, and mentally drained. We played last night with basically 14 skaters, and to do it again today, it wasespecially tough losing two or three guys early in the game.”
Kent opened the scoring at 12:06 of the first period on a set up from Ryan Terpsma and Kyle Hope, but less than twominutes later, Conner Brennan replied for Grand Forks on a power play goal from Grambo and Leonidas. Terpsma netted histhird of the season blasting a pass from McKoy Hauk past Tyler Loura to restore the one goal lead heading into the secondperiod.
The Border Bruins Trey Mason beat Kramer at 16:37 of the second period to tie it at two, but Damon Kramer restored theone-goal lead 24 seconds later as the Hawks outshot Grand Forks 18-8 in the period.
Beaver Valley dominated again in the third, but Tyler Loura came up big in net for the Bruins and Evan Loura tallied theequalizer, tipping in a shot from Noah Lemoine with 9:03 to play.
“Last night we were amazing, and today we were amazingly bad,” said Jones. “We had zero focus, our power play was non-existent, but I have look at this as a learning experience, guys have to hold themselves accountable and be better.”
The Hawks outshot Grand Forks 51-28 and went 1-for-5 on the power play, while Grand Forks was 2-for-4. Damon Kramerearned player of the game for the Hawks, and Tyler Loura for the Border Bruins.
The loss was only the second suffered by the Nitehawks in their last 20 games, and with a 22-2-1-2 record B.V. is far frompressing the panic button. Still, a little break is something the players, coaches, and staff are all looking forward to.
“It’s been a great run, and we have a great group of guys, that I know we’ll rebound after Christmas. But no one’s satisfiedwhen you don’t play to your full potential.”
Beaver Valley returns to the ice on Dec. 28 against the Castlegar Rebels at 7 p.m. the Hawks Nest.
