Friday November the 13th, New Hamburg invaded the home of the Dunnville Terriers. The game was a relatively quiet see-saw battle with Dunnville having an opportiunity to erase the goose-egg from their stats. Tyler Gilbertson did his part in goal for Dunnville stopping 33 of 36 attempts and allowing very few second chance rebounds. Tyler was Dunnville’s star of the game on this night. Dunnville manager 18 shots with several very good opportunities to dent the twine. Two goal post saves prevented the game from turning in Dunnville’s favor and the momentum stayed with New Hamburg.

The first two periods were fairly even in good chances. The game was fast and rough play was at a minimum for most of the three periods. Penalties however did make a big difference in Dunnville’s chances to end the winless drought. Dunnville’s classy playmaker, top scorer and gamebreaker missed most of the second and third period sitting in the sinbin or trudging up the stairs to the dressing room. Fueds with the officials cost Dan Minor and his teammates the effects of his experience and his constant offensive threat.

New Hamburg drew first blood at 12:21 of the first period when a miscue at the right of Gilbertston was gobbled up by Blake Jordan, sent over to Colin Elby who made no mistake putting it by an unsuspecting Gilbertson. The surprised Dunnville netminder had no chance on the shot.

Despite losing Dan Minor early in the second, the hard working line led by Taylor Schwoob brought the crowd to their feet. A neat short pass play at 7:14 resulting from some successful forechecking by his linemates deep in the New Hamburg end set Taylor in to tie the score. Assists were earned by Mitch Barnes and Tyler Springer with relentless bumping and grinding in the corners. The spirited surge was short lived when a powerplay goal at the 4:12 mark by the Burg’s Don Macpherson came from passplay contributions and assists from Russ Soehner and Mike Pleon.

At a slight 2-1 disadvantage and the loss again of Minor in the third, Dunnville found it hard to muster the offense necessary to close the gap and forge ahead. An unassisted maker at 10:56 of the third by Andrew Barton preserved the win for New Hamburg and the goose-egg remained. It was back to the blackboard for the Terriers.

By Dave Green, The Sachem