Staff
The Muskie girls’ hockey team took their border rivals to school on Saturday afternoon.
Issy Taylor scored twice and assisted on two others to pace the Muskies to a 5-1 win over the International Falls Broncos in the opener of their annual two-game “Border Battle” exhibition series at Bronco Arena.
Taylor opened the scoring for Fort High near the 12-minute mark of the first period as she snapped a shot from just inside the blueline past Broncos’ goalie Macey Marcotte.
The Muskies also outshot the Broncos by a commanding 15-2 margin in the frame.
But the Broncos came back to tie it just under seven minutes into the second as Emma Erickson buried a pass from the left side past Muskie goalie Jersey Masson.
Some good pressure down low in the Broncos’ end led to the Muskies regaining the lead as Abbie Kenny finished off a feed from Taylor near the nine-minute mark.
Kathryn Fischer then backhanded one home in front of Marcotte to make it 3-1 Muskies after 34 minutes.
In the third, Taylor potted her second of the afternoon just over five minutes in as she buried a feed from Kenny to push it to a three-goal lead.
Hailey Bombay then shovelled home the rebound of Tatum Glowsky’s shot at the right of Marcotte just over a minute later to cap the scoring.
Masson made six saves to earn the win while Marcotte was much busier, turning aside 44 shots to suffer the loss.
The two sides will meet again for the finale on Jan. 20 at the Ice For Kids Arena.
Both the Muskie girls’ and boys’ squads are slated to resume NorWOSSA action tomorrow night when they welcome the St. Thomas Aquinas Saints (Kenora).
The girls’ contest is slated for 7:30 p.m. at the ’52 Canadians Arena, where it also will be their annual “Teddy Bear Toss” game.
The boys’ game, meanwhile, will go at 7:15 p.m. at the Ice For Kids Arena before they then cap the week with another home game against the Red Lake Rams on Friday at the same time at IFK.
