Joey Payeur
It was Devin Tappenden’s homecoming but the Fort Frances Lakers weren’t providing any gift-wrapped victories for their former goalie.
Dylan Robertson scored twice as the Lakers edged the Minnesota Iron Rangers 5-4 here Saturday night to swept the home-and-home series.
It also was the team’s 12th-straight victory.
The 20-year-old from Markham, Ont.—dealt to the Iron Rangers at the Jan. 10 trade deadline—was hoping to give his ex-team a reason to regret that transaction.
“I was really up for this one . . . it was good to see some old faces,” said Tappenden, who allowed third-period goals to Robertson and Nick Minerva after Minnesota (19-14-5) had rallied from a 3-1 deficit to draw even by the second intermission.
“The bounces did not go our way and they did for them,” he noted.
“But it’s a real hard-working group and I’m proud of the way we battled back to tie it up.”
The Lakers (29-7-0-1), who have lost only twice in 21 games since Nov. 1, also moved up one spot to No. 10 in the Canadian Junior Hockey League’s top 20 rankings.
But even with the eighth-best winning percentage in the 129-team CJHL right now (.797), Fort Frances would be a most welcome opponent in Tappenden’s eyes for a possible future confrontation in the SIJHL final.
“I want nothing else,” he declared. “I mean it.”
Lakers’ head coach and general manager Wayne Strachan, whose team nipped the Iron Rangers 2-1 in Hoyt Lakes last Wednesday (Jan. 21), was more worried about the present even though his team has one of the top three winning streaks in the country.
“I may be a tough judge but to me, we’re just getting by right now,” said Strachan, whose squad is running away with top spot in the SIJHL.
The Lakers now lead the second-place Thunder Bay North Stars (21-16-4) by 13 points while also holding four games in hand.
“We’re finding ways to win but I don’t think we’re playing to our full potential,” Strachan admitted.
“We’ve talked about keeping ourselves motivated and making ourselves a better team,” he noted.
“But when we hit 10 in a row, we got to the point where everybody’s writing about the winning streak, and we’ve had a couple of our guys get picked player-of-the-week, and we’ve forgotten why we won those first 10.
“We’ve got to get back to having a mentality of hard work,” Strachan stressed.
Leading 1-0 after Robertson’s first goal, the Lakers doubled the lead on a 2-on-1 that turned into a 2-on-none when Lucas DeBenedet pulled off a move straight out of “Top Gun.”
DeBenedet hit the brakes and watched the Iron Rangers’ defenceman slide right by before sending the puck over to fill-in linemate Donovan Cousineau for an easy tap-in.
Cousineau played the last two games with DeBenedet and Mason Meyer as Bryson Jasper was unavailable due to being at his sister’s wedding.
Gus Karkinen got Minnesota into the game with a breakaway goal that saw him beat Lakers’ goalie Pierce Dushenko five-hole with 54 seconds left in the frame.
The Rangers had an outstanding chance to tie the game early in the second—getting a two-man advantage for 1:43 that was more like a 5-on-2 for the most part when the Lakers’ Sam Schultz broke his stick and had to play without one.
But Fort Frances fended off the assault and, shortly after, Nolan Ross fired a shot past Tappenden to make it a two-goal game again.
The Iron Rangers squared the game with two goals in just over four minutes later in the second.
Carter Chorney turned the puck over behind the Lakers’ net, which led to Noah Anderson blasting home a rebound of Jason Reynolds’ original shot.
Then a good forechecking shift paid dividends when Seth Chumley spotted Evan Erickson in the left circle, who whistled the puck past Dushenko.
In the third, Cousineau found Robertson dashing up the middle, who unloaded a wrist shot that snuck through Tappenden’s pads for the go-ahead goal.
“That was all Donovan,” credited Robertson, who had his first multi-goal game of the season.
“I just got the puck and threw it at the net and good things happened. . . .
“When it comes to this win streak, we just have to hit the reset button each night and pretend it never happened,” he added.
Minerva then cranked home a loose puck after DeBenedet’s foray to the net was turned aside by Tappenden.
The Lakers’ inability to clear the puck out cost them in the final stages as Anderson netted his second of the game with seven seconds left on the clock, but time then ran out on the Iron Rangers.
“It wasn’t our best game but we got the win and that’s what matters,” said Dushenko, who finished with 24 saves.
“Minnesota’s tough because they come at you with three, four guys in a row and with a lot of odd-man rushes,” he noted.
“They usually capitalize on their chances when they get them.”
The Lakers hope to make Hoyt Lakes Arena their home away from home over the next week, with three games against three different teams there to open a stretch of five-straight road games.
As part of the annual “SIJHL Showcase,” which draws scouts from the junior, university, and professional ranks, Fort Frances will take on the English River Miners (9-27-4) tonight.
The Lakers then meet Thunder Bay tomorrow before returning to Hoyt Lakes on Tuesday (Feb. 3) to play the Iron Rangers.
Their next home game is set for Feb. 10 against the Dryden GM Ice Dogs.
That game will be played at “The Duke” (Couchiching Arena) starting at 7:30 p.m.
