MUSKEGON – The Muskegon Lumberjacks faced a lot of challenges on Friday night, with the loss of four top players to an international tournament for the next five games, plus a coaching change and the sale of the team, which were announced earlier in the day.

With all of that swirling around, nobody would have been surprised if the Jacks had come up short against the Team USA 17-Under squad.

But the Lumberjacks have been battlers all season, and they rose to the occasion again, stealing an exciting 4-3 overtime victory.

Cody Croal was the hero for the Jacks, knocking in the rebound of his own shot at 4:33 of the five-minute overtime period. It was the continuation of a hot streak for Croal, who scored two goals last Sunday in the Jacks’ victory in Dubuque and has three in the last four games.

“It feels good to get going and it was a good win for us,” Croal said. “It is obviously not easy to have four guys leave, plus your head coach, but (new head coach Parker) Burgess told us to put it behind us and just play hockey.”

There were other heroes as well.

New goalie Raythan Robbins, making his second start for the Jacks, stood on his head in overtime, stopping shots by two Team USA players on breakaways that could have ended the game. He had 31 saves on 34 shots in the game.

New forward Ethan Fredericks, acquired from Des Moines in a trade earlier this week, got off to a good start by scoring the game’s first goal.

The Jacks’ penalty kill unit also continued its amazing play, keeping Team USA scoreless on three power plays and scoring two shorthanded goals. The Jacks have now scored five shorthanded goals in the past six games, including three in the past two.

All in all, it was a great start to the weekend for the Lumberjacks, who improved to 12-8-1. They will try to keep their momentum going with a home game against the first-place Chicago Steel on Saturday night.

“I was proud of the guys,” said Burgess, who was introduced as the new coach on Friday afternoon. “It was an emotionally charged week for us with a lot of external distractions, and it’s tough for young men that age to focus on what’s in front of them. In the game there were some ups and downs, as well, and I am proud of how they handled it.”

The Jacks got off to a good start, taking a 2-0 lead after one period on a goal by Fredericks at the 14:23 mark and a shorthanded tally from Justin Solovey at 16:37.

Team USA punched back in the second period, collecting goals from Kamil Bednarik at 9:41, James Hagen at 15:39 and Lucas Van Vliet at 17:07 to take a 3-2 lead.

But the Jacks kept battling in the third period and got the tying goal from Nicholas Rexine at the 4:54 mark that sent the game to overtime.

Both teams had a lot of good scoring chances in the wide-open OT period before Croal settled the issue by scoring with just under a half minute remaining in the clock.