The Great Falls Americans defeated the Titans 6 – 2 this afternoon in the third and final game of the NA3HL League Showcase in Blaine, MN. It is the Red Buckets fourth consecutive loss.
The Titans opened the scoring with 3:46 remaining in the first period on Joey Mataviesko’s third goal of the season to make it a 1 – 0 game. Mataviesko’s goal was the first time in 202 minutes (over 10 periods of play) that the Titans scored a goal.
The Americans then scored four unanswered second period goals to take control of the game. Thomas Gazich scored a shorthanded goal at 7:14 into the middle stanza to tie the game. Silas Hughes scored a powerplay goal at 8:38 of the period to make it 2 – 1. Daniel Crutcher scored his twelfth goal of the season to give the Americans a 3 – 1 lead. Great Falls’ Jay Alford scored with twenty-nine seconds left in the period to make it 4 – 1.
Roland Ponechal scored at 4:12 of the final period for his tenth goal of the season to cut the Titans deficit in half but it wasn’t enough as the Americans’ Jackson Henningsgard scored a pair of goals to close out the scoring and make it a 6 – 2 game.
Titans netminders Tyrus Pratley and Colin Freitas combined to stop 70 of 76 shots while the Americans’ Ben Winkler turned aside 18 of 20. Click here for the box score.
The Titans will be off for a couple of weeks for the Christmas break. Their next game will be Friday, January 7 when they host the Danbury Jr. Hat Tricks at 1230PM.