RHS hockey suffers back-to-back losses

A pair of non-conference games less than 24 hours apart yielded nearly identical results for the Rhinelander High School boys’ hockey team late last week.

The Hodags lost at home to Kingsford, Mich. 4-0 Thursday night at the Rhinelander Ice Arena then traveled to Ashland Friday afternoon and suffered another 4-0 defeat. 

The Hodags (2-18-0) are in another prolonged scoring drought. The Hodags have gone five straight games without a goal and scored only three goals combined in the three games prior to that. 

“If we could score, we know that those games could have looked different for sure,” Hodag coach M.J. Laggis said following Friday’s loss to Ashland. “We get scoring chances but we just we don’t score. We don’t finish very well. I should preface that we don’t get a ton of scoring chances but when we do, we’re not finishing very well. That’s going to be a big focus going forward.”

Kingsford 4, Rhinelander 0

The Hodags hung around for a good portion of the game, but Kingsford’s constant pressure and transition game proved to be too much in a 4-0 loss to the Flivvers at home Thursday night. 

Asher Rivord made 46 saves in the game as Kingsford outshot Rhinelander 50-19. 

Jaxon Buckley scored twice for Kingsford, scoring the lone goal of the first period and the last tally as part of a three-goal second. 

“I thought in the defensive end we played really well,” Laggis said. “Asher Rivord played outstanding tonight, made a lot of second-, third-level saves. There was one there in the second period where he made the save, made another save, then jumped out and paddled it out to the blue line. He had a lot of second, third efforts with a really good attitude.

“I thought our defensive core as a group played really hard. Gabe Kennedy just continues to work harder and harder and I’m really impressed with that. and I really think Jack Turek’s come along. I think Zach Edyvean’s playing his best hockey of the year overall and I think Riley Squires is turning into a really nice defenseman.”

Kingsford’s ability to transition quickly in the neutral zone came back to bite Rhinelander on a couple of occasions, including Buckley’s first goal. That came as part of a 2-on-1 chance at the 10:41 mark of the opening period. 

Gavin Moore scored on another breakaway chance 5:20 into the second, using his speed to get past the Rhinelander defense. The Flivvers had several other odd-man rushes in the contest that Rhinelander diffused. 

“Their captain (Moore) there has explosive speed, very, very good speed. And they had a couple of guys that could bounce it to the outside and get it to the net,” Laggis said. “We’re not a strong transition team. You know, not throwing daggers at anyone, but we work on that transition aspect of it and we just haven’t been effective and that’s sort of the game. We’ve had teams, you know, the last five, six years that were excellent transition teams. And that’s just not a strong suit of this team.”

Evan Moyer scored for the Flivvers just 50 seconds into the second period, winning a battle for the puck in the low slot and banging a one-timer past Rivord. Buckley rounded out the scoring with 2:55 remaining in the second scoring off a pass from behind the net by Will Murvich. 

Outshot 38-10 through two periods, the Hodags kept things much closer in the third, but had difficulty creating quality scoring chances. 

“It’s obvious we’re not scoring many goals and we need to score some goals. You got to do that to compete. There’s no way around that,” Laggis said. “You know, we have a lot of drills that we do that we work on … but the bottom line is, you got to be able to have a little better on that, have a little moxie and put some pucks home and we’re just not right now.”

Thursday was senior night at the RIA as a quintet of Hodags — Nate Cordy, Van Tulowitzky, Zach Edyvean, Timber Cronauer and Karter Massey — played their penultimate home game. They will get one more contest at the RIA this coming Saturday in the final round of the Great Northern Conference tournament. 

“It’s nice to get them out there in the starting lineup and nice to talk about them before the game,” Laggis said. “I do wish them well as the season winds down here at some point and they move on to bigger and better. But a really nice group of guys and we wish them the best.”

Ashland 4, Rhinelander 0

Friday’s game in Ashland was almost a mirror image of Thursday but instead of a solid finish after a slower start, the Hodags faded after two strong periods in a loss to the Oredockers. 

Rhinelander trailed just 1-0 after two periods but Ashland’s Landon Puskoulich scored twice in the first 3:33 of the third period and the Oredockers added another goal about four minutes later to account for the final margin. 

“I thought we played a better second period than the first. Even though they scored in the second, we had a number of chances and we were either unable to hit the spot or unable to get a rebound,” Laggis said. “I think we gave up our three goals in the third within about four minutes or so and then we were done so just a big lapse and let down and then you know just got away from us.”

After a scoreless first period, Ashland got on the board on an Isaac Ellison goal roughly 9 1/2 minutes into the second period to give Ashland the lead. 

Laggis conceded that back-to-back games with a short bench took a toll on the Hodags late in Friday’s contest. 

“Any time that you play a lot of hockey in a short period of time (it takes a toll). And remember yesterday we played the majority of the game with seven forwards and then six forwards basically most of the game,” he said. “We did have three lines today, but I think you know definitely when you play a game at 7 o’clock and then travel play the next day at four, you know it has it to factor.

Rhinelander was outshot 50-29 in the contest. Rivord made 46 saves for a second consecutive contest.  

Up next

Rhinelander travels to Antigo tonight in the consolation round of the GNC tournament. Despite missing a handful of players, the Robins rallied in the third period to defeat Rhinelander 6-4 back in December. 

The Hodags will then travel to Park Falls on Thursday for their final non-conference game of the year against Chequamegon/

Phillips. Rhinelander defeated the SEaLS 6-2 back on Dec. 3.

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].