December 23, 2022 at 8:45 a.m.
Hodags skate into holidays with 4-1 win
Hodags skate into holidays with 4-1 win
A quick response by the fifth-ranked Hodags put to rest any of those concerns.
Layne Roeser scored his second goal of the night and A.J. Turek added a goal in a 57-second stretch that propelled Rhinelander to a 4-1 victory over Marshfield in a non-conference contest at the Rhinelander Ice Arena.
It was a bounce-back win for the Hodags (5-1-0, 2-0-0-0 Great Northern), after giving up four third-period goals in 6-2 loss to the Jets Dec. 17.
The Hodags led 2-0 after dominating the second period on Wednesday but the Tigers quickly made it a one-goal game as Tyler Reissman capitalized on a turnover and skated in for a breakaway goal just 21 seconds in to the third period.
That was the only goal junior Tyler Kimmerling allowed as he stopped 20 pucks in the win and, within 5 1/2 minutes of Reissman's tally, the Hodags had pushed the lead from one to three.
"Just when you thought we were going to go flat we really put some nice pressure on and buried a couple of goals," Hodag coach M.J. Laggis said. "That's a sign of a pretty solid hockey team to come back like that. I was proud of that effort."
Roeser, a senior defenseman, vaulted into the team lead, scoring his eighth and ninth goals of the season in the contest. Goal No. 9 provided a big lift for Rhinelander in a one-goal game. Joey Belanger handled the puck behind the Marshfield end line and found Roeser crashing in from the right point. Roeser fired top shelf past Marshfield goalie Cole Halvorsen to give Rhinelander a 3-1 lead at the 4:54 mark of the third.
The cliche "most dangerous lead in hockey" was short-lived as Turek added an insurance goal less than a minute later. The senior banged home his own rebound after lineman Gavin Denis fed the puck to him in front of the net.
"I can't say enough about Layne Roeser's eye for the net," Laggis said. "AJ Turek, that was a goal were he just made a couple of fantastic plays and was rewarded with a nice rebound right there. I thought he really had a nice comeback game from where he was at Saturday. I was happy with that as well."
Rhinelander picked up the offensive pressure following a scoreless first period in which there were only eight total shots between the two teams. The Hodags had five shots in the opening 17 minutes, and needed less than two minutes to double that total in the second period. All the pressure finally led to the opening goal as defenseman Cody Everson fired from the right point and tucked a shot inside the right post, past a screened Halvorsen at the 2:25 mark of the second.
"Cody Everson is quietly playing some fantastic hockey and that hard, low shot was just exactly what the doctor ordered right there," Laggis said. "One thing we talked about in the locker room is F2, our second forward on that forecheck, was not making plays. We felt like our first forward was getting there and disrupting stuff, but we just didn't feel like F2 was getting there and making plays. I thought we changed that around in the second period. For probably five straight minutes there we held pretty good pressure and that kind of got the momentum going our way to get a couple-goal lead there. That was really good."
Roeser added a power play goal 13:07 into the second that gave the Hodags a 2-0 lead. Leo Losch and Belanger each picked up two assists in the game - recording their tenth and ninth helpers on the year, respectively.
"Leo's line, they played with a lot of heart and a lot of energy," Laggis said. "Then Joey Belanger is all over the ice and has done so much. I think Joey's been one of our most consistent players of the last couple of games. I'm pretty pleased with that as well."
Kimmerling improved to 3-0 on the season thanks to his 20-save performance. He helped the Hodags kill off four Marshfield power plays in the game, including a five-minute major at the end of the contest.
"We had a lot of big penalty kills, and a lot of that was with Kimmerling making some saves," Laggis said. "We ran around a little bit and gave up some pucks on the kill. Don't get me wrong, I applaud our kill but we gave up some shots. I thought Kimmy did a good job of holding us in there at those points."
The Marshfield game was originally scheduled for Thursday evening, but was pushed forward one day ahead of the winter storm system that impacted the area late Wednesday night through Saturday morning. Rhinelander lost a couple of days of practice as a result, but will have all this week and early next week to gear up for a 12-game January slate that begins with a home GNC contest against Medford Jan. 5.
"We're going to have a four-day break we didn't expect, but it's probably what the doctor ordered," Laggis said, referencing the snow-related practice cancellations. "We're still hacking and coughing in that locker room. We've got to get healthy. We're going to hit Jan. 10 and then it's going to be three games every five days basically. We've got to really have some good practices."
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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