Courtesy of TheCarillon.com – Picture Courtesy of Dave Mikkola
The Steinbach Pistons put an exclamation mark on the 2015 portion of their 2015-16 Manitoba Junior Hockey League season with a 7-2 triumph over the Selkirk Steelers Saturday night in Steinbach.
With 36 games now in the books and a superb 26-8-2 record, the Pistons have now dispersed for the Christmas break and will reconvene on Dec. 28 to resume practicing to get ready for the final two months of the regular season.
Saturday’s game against the Steelers was a nail biter for most of the contest. Selkirk opened the scoring just a minute after the opening faceoff but the Pistons responded with a pair of goals by Tyler Penner and Mackenzie Graham to take a 2-1 lead at the first intermission.
With no scoring in the second, Selkirk finally tied it three minutes into the third. But just two minutes later Julien Koga again gave the Pistons the lead in what was the winning goal, the first of five straight in the third as the Pistons win 7-2.
Koga and Cole Smith each had a goal and two assists on the night. Hayden Goderis, Jordan Bochinski and Matthieu Gomercic were the other Steinbach goal scorers.
Steinbach outshot the Steelers 42-29 as Roman Bengert picked up the win in net for the Pistons.
After scoring only once in a 4-1 loss to the Blues last Wednesday, which snapped Steinbach’s five-game streak, the Pistons, who also beat the Steelers 6-4 Friday at Selkirk, erupted for 13 goals in the two-game series with the Steelers.
The Steinbach Pistons weren’t the only ones scoring an impressive victory on Saturday. Pistons’ head Paul Dyck was an asssistant coach with Team West that beat Russia 2-1 in the gold medal game at the World Junior ‘A’ Challenge at Cobourg, Ont. “It’s a pretty special feeling beating the Russians,” said Dyck following the game.” Dyck missed the Pistons’ last eight games while he was coaching at the World Junior ‘A’ Challenge and the Pistons were 7-1 during that stretch.
Two members of the Portage Terriers, defencemen Brett Orr and Dean Stewart, were also members of that gold medal winning Team Western.
The Pistons are now idle until Jan. 2 when they will take on the MJHL-leading Terriers at Portage and the two teams will play again the following night in Steinbach.