The North Island Peewee Eagles arrived back home after a couple weekends on the road and did they ever give the hometown crowd a reason to stand up and cheer.
The Eagles faced off against the Tier 2 Nanaimo Clippers on Saturday at the Don Cruickshank Memorial Arena in Port Hardy, and it turned out to be quite the exciting back and forth game.
The Eagles got out to a quick start, scoring two goals in under two minutes courtesy of Kyle Rushton (assisted by Rylan Krawietz) and Dakota Knighton (assisted by Jayce Cheetham), but the Clippers came firing back with a goal of their own at 4:01 from Tyson Moutray (assisted by Oliver Lynch).
The Eagles managed to find the back of the net once more with 50 seconds left on the clock thanks to Tanner Livingston, which was assisted by Rushton, to make it 3-1.
After a brief intermission, the Eagles came out flying in the second period and scored at 17:21 courtesy of Carter Henschke, assisted by Livingston, and then scored again at 5:52 off a shot from Yuri Noel (assisted by Maddox Peterson) to tilt the scoreboard 5-1 for the Eagles.
Roman Lavery managed to net a goal for the Clippers at 1:42, assisted by Lynch and Deacon Hills, but that’s how the score would stay until there was 52 seconds left in the third when Lavery banged one more puck past Eagles’ goaltender Lucas Handley, which was assisted by Moutray.
Final score, 5-3 for the Eagles.
The victory was “a total team effort,” said assistant coach Kevin Livingston. “All three lines and all of our defence came ready to play and contributed in the win.”
Livingston added that Handley made some big saves when called upon, and “moving into the last game of the year against Comox, it should be an exciting game.”
The Eagles are currently sitting tied for first place in VIAHA’s Tier 3 division with the Tier 2 Comox Valley Chiefs, with the last game of regular season held on Sunday at 12:30 p.m. in Port McNeill, with the winning team most likely clinching the league banner.
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