That’s more like it.
The Muskegon Lumberjacks entered Saturday night’s contest struggling of late, dropping their last three games.
It was the longest losing streak for the Lumberjacks since they lost five straight contests in late October when the team was sitting at the bottom of the USHL’s Eastern Conference.
Now the team is tied for first place with the defending Anderson Cup champion Chicago Steel, looking to maintain the top spot with a lot of the regular season left to play.
The Lumberjacks bounced back from last night’s ugly loss, beating the Madison Capitols 4-3 at the Mercy Health Arena.
Muskegon is now 23-11-6 on the season, good for 52 points on the season.
[1]The Lumberjacks will face the Youngstown Phantoms on Friday and Saturday next weekend on the road. Both games are slated to faceoff at 7:05 p.m.
“They were pretty disappointed in themselves and in their efforts last night,” said Lumberjacks coach Mike Hamilton. “We watched a lot of bad video clips this morning and thought we played really tight.
“Madison is a team we could see in the playoffs and when you lose a game then you have to respond. The mentality from us tonight was that it was a must win for us and I think we responded very well.”
The Lumberjacks earned this win as they finished the game without two of their players in the lineup as both Owen Mehlenbacher and Ethan Whitcomb were given misconducts.
“We ran a little out of gas during the third period,” Hamilton said. “But I thought the defense and goaltending played really strong and was phenomenal.”
Muskegon goaltender Aleksandr Kuleshov played much better in net tonight, stopping 38-of-41 shots faced.
[2]“We traded for Chase Clark, and he was sick today, so we weren’t able to go to him,” Hamilton said. “I was really happy with how Kuleshov stepped up and he is going to be really important to us as we move on to the playoffs.”
The Lumberjacks took advantage of a Madison tripping penalty, opening the scoring with a power play goal from Jake Richard at the 6:49 mark of the first period.
Muskegon increased its lead to 2-0 on Jacob Napier’s first goal of the season 7:58 into the first period.
The Capitols had an opportunity to cut into their deficit when Mehlenbacher was ticketed for a five-minute penalty and game misconduct at the 13:09 mark of the first period.
Madison not only failed to score but allowed a short-handed breakaway goal by Phil Tresca 13:53 into the first period.
The Lumberjacks had a comfortable 3-0 lead at the first intermission.
Madison finally ended the shutout bid, scoring on a power play goal from Kyle Kukkonen 12:05 into the second period to cut the Lumberjacks lead to 3-1.
Muskegon responded a little over a minute later with an unassisted goal from Ben Strinden at the 13:11 mark of the second period.
The Lumberjacks headed into the final period with a 4-1 advantage.
The Capitols had an early power play opportunity but failed to score until 35 seconds passed after Muskegon killed off its infraction.
[3]Jake Dunlap cut Madison’s deficit to 4-2 with a tally at the 2:45 mark of the third period.
The Lumberjacks lost their second player of the game for a bit as Whitcomb received a 10-minute misconduct for checking from behind 3:55 into the third period.
The Capitols continued to pour on the pressure throughout the third and finally succeeded with a goal 15:00 minutes into the stanza by Matthew McGroarty.
The Lumberjacks advantage was cut to 4-3 late in the contest.
Muskegon was given an opportunity to regain its two-goal advantage with a power play with 3:30 left in regulation but failed to find the back of the net.
The Lumberjacks managed to keep puck control for enough time to make it difficult for Madison to pull its goalie for an extra attacker until the final 20 seconds of the contest.
Muskegon held on to seal the victory and end the losing streak.
The Lumberjacks were outshot by a 41-33 margin and were 1-for-4 on the man advantage, while killing off four of Madison’s power plays.