MUSKEGON – Muskegon Lumberjacks forward Jake Braccini came to the team during the bad times, when wins were few and confidence was at a minimum.

In more recent weeks he’s enjoyed being part of the Jacks’ turnaround, which continued on Friday night with a 4-1 victory over the Team USA 17-Under squad at Mercy Health Arena.

Braccini scored twice in the victory, which gave Muskegon five wins in a row, and nine victories in their last 10 games.

The Lumberjacks improved to 11-8-3 on the season. They will travel to Chicago on Saturday for a big game against the first-place Steel.

Muskegon’s Tyler Hotson tries to get the puck past Team USA goalie Michael Chambre. Photo/Tonya Pardon

“It’s a great group of guys in that room,” said Braccini, who came to the Jacks in October in a trade with Fargo. “Everybody is always talking and joking around, and at the end of the day it makes a difference in the long season.”

“Once you get a couple of wins you feed off that energy, and I think we just hated losing and didn’t want to keep doing it. We are getting the little details of our game going as a team, and everybody is buying into the team structure and finding our roles. We have great depth up and down the lineup.

“Everybody likes scoring. I was happy to be a part of that win.”

The Jacks certainly didn’t play their best game on Friday, which was to be expected, because some of their top players were missing.

High-scoring forward Quinn Hutson is on loan to the Team USA 18-Under squad for the weekend for games against college teams. Defenseman Noah Ellis and forwards Ethan Whitcombe and Emil Jarventie were serving one-game suspensions for fighting against Cedar Rapids last weekend, and goalie Cameron Korpi was ill.

Owen Mehlenbacher moves the puck up the ice for the Jacks while teammate David Hymovitch trails the play. Photo/Tonya Pardon

But the Jacks still took the ice with the confidence of a team that knew it would win, and quickly got the upper hand with three goals in the first seven minutes.

“I don’t think by any means it was our best game, but we played good enough to put a few away early and we sat on it,” said Lumberjacks coach Mike Hamilton. “I thought in the third we played a pretty clean hockey game, and it was nice to see different guys step up.

“It probably wasn’t our best lineup due to sickness and suspensions. But it was nice to find a way to get it done. We know we need to be better tomorrow if we are going to beat Chicago.”

Muskegon Defenseman Jacob Guevin started things out with a shot from between the circles that found the goal just 49 seconds into the game.

Ben Strinden added his 10th goal of the season at the 4:47 mark, then Braccini scored his first goal at the 6:36 mark of the first period.

Muskegon’s Jacob Napier looks for a pass or a shot from the point. Photo/Tonya Pardon

Team USA got its only goal of the evening from Aram Minnetian at 11:22 of the first, and the Jacks led 3-1 after one period.

The second period was scoreless, then Braccini scored his second goal of the game at 7:46 of the third period to give Muskegon its final margin of victory.

The Lumberjacks outshot Team USA 44-21. While he had the cushion of an early lead and didn’t have to stop a ton of shots, Hamilton credited goalie Platon Zadorozhnyy with making some big saves on shots that could have changed the complexion of the game.

“The things you forget about a game like this is the big saves he made,” Hamilton said. “He had three huge saves to allow us to pull away at the end.”

Guevin had an assist in the victory, along with Jack Williams, Phil Tresca, Jeremiah Slavin, Joey Larson, Nick Peluso and Parker Lindauer.

SCORING SUMMARY

First period
Muskegon :49, Jacob Guevin (3) (Jack Williams, Phil Tresca)
Muskegon 4:47, Ben Strinden (10) (Jeremiah Slavin, Joey Larson)
Muskegon 6:36, Jake Braccini (7) (Nick Peluso, Jacob Guevin)

Second period
No scoring

Third period
Muskegon 7:46, Jake Braccini (8) (Parker Lindauer)