Northstars gain ground in race for home playoffs

Photo by Ian Graham

East Division all-star Roger Tagoona celebrates his game-tying goal Jan. 9 against the Central Plains Capitals. The Norman Northstars went on to win the game 5-2.

Roger Tagoona scored his team-leading 23rd and 24th goals of the season Jan. 9 to lead the Norman Northstars to a 5-2 come-from-behind victory over the Central Plains Capitals and give them three out of a possible four points over the weekend series.

With 13:07 left in the third period and his team trailing by one, Tagoona backhanded the rebound of a Trent Tootoo shot over the pad of Central Plains goaltender Bryan Tait to even the score 2-2. After Jaron Campbell scored on a similar play on a late power play to put the Northstars up by one, Tagoona sealed the deal with 1:25 left, banging a puck off the end boards into an empty net with his team shorthanded to make the score 4-2. Dillan McCombie added another empty-netter, also shorthanded, with 17.2 seconds left to make the final 5-2.

Tootoo had the Northstars' only goal of the opening period.

Tyler McKay put the Capitals ahead with 4:59 to play in the second period, walking out from the corner and roofing one high short-side past Norman goaltender Ryan Delorme.

Tagoona, recently named with three teammates to the Manitoba AAA Midget Hockey League's East Division all-star team, also had a goal the previous night, as the Northstars went 4-for-6 on the power play but lost 6-5 in a shootout despite holding two-goal leads three times through regulation.

McKay opened the scoring for the Capitals just over five minutes into the game, when he beat Delorme on the first shot of the game. The lead held until the last two minutes of the period, when a parade of Central Plains penalties gave the Northstars an extended two-man advantage.

Wayne Folster drew the Northstars even, scoring his seventh goal of the season on a rebound with his team playing 5-on-3. Twenty-three seconds later, with the Northstars still holding a two-man advantage, Tagoona scored his 22nd, banging in a rebound. Then, with 27 seconds left in the period, Dylan Hykawy blasted a slapshot off Capitals' goaltender Kyle McGibney's trapper, prompting coach Blaine Boyle to yank him in favour of Tait.

Tyler Durdle scored seven minutes into the middle frame to reduce the gap to one, but Cody Zulyniak got his 16th of the season on another power play just past the midway mark to re-establish the two-goal lead. But with only 11.6 seconds left, McKay finished off a give-and-go with Ryan Seekings to give Central Plains some life heading into the third period down 4-3.

The Northstars looked to have given themselves a cushion when Kenton Fayant banked one in from behind the goal line less than a minute into the third period, but Douglas Lawrence made it a one-goal game less than three minutes later before one-man wrecking crew Mckay made it a 5-5 game with his third goal of the game with 10 minutes to play.

Overtime resolved nothing and McKay scored what turned out to be the winner on the first shot of the shootout, as Rylan Veitch and Quentin Holmes couldn't solve Tait on their attempts.

With their first win at home since Dec. 5, the Northstars' record improves to 13-20-1-1, good for 28 points, four back of the third- and fourth-place Interlake Lightning and Winnipeg Thrashers in the East Division, both of whom have a pair of games in hand. The Lightning lost 5-1 to the Pembina Valley Hawks and 5-0 to the Southwest Cougars over the weekend, while the Thrashers, who face off with Interlake tonight, were 5-3 winners over the Kenora Thistles in their most recent game Jan. 6.

The Northstars are off next weekend, except for four players taking part in the all-star game in Brandon Jan. 17. They resume play Jan. 23-24 at home when the league-leading Winnipeg Wild, who've lost just four times this season, including an overtime loss to the Northstars in October, pay a visit to the C.A. Nesbitt Arena.

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