Jan 07, 2019 | GeoffRead | 467 views
When the Going Gets Tough, Gregory NIcolis and Teammates Get Going
There are times when it is a privilege to witness a sporting event. Such was the case Monday night when the Atom Hawks A4 played the first-place North London B4 squad at Carling Arena. It was a tightly played affair as one might expect with such tough opposition. But when the going gets tough, the tough tend to get going, and the Hawks answered the bell in this one.
Player of the game Gregory Nicolis led the way with some hard play on the boards. Nicolis rubbed National forwards out along the sides all night long like he was squishing mosquitoes with his boot. In all seriousness, Nicolis had a good match keeping the game simple and moving the puck smartly out of harm's way. Given the nature of this hard-grinding game, he was an appropriately hard-working player to be its player of the game.
That was the theme for most of this one: smart, tough play by the Hawks. Truthfully, the team probably held the edge in puck possession and zone time thanks to 1) some excellent forechecking and cycling by the forwards and 2) some good work keeping the puck in at the blueline by Nicolis and his comrades on the blueline, Anderson Watt, Brandon Miles, and Aiden Hayes. As a unit they had a very strong game all around and really did not give up many chances to the Nationals. One goal against came off a goalmouth scramble and the other was a flukey goal, which deflected in off a defender's stick on the rush.
The Hawks' goals on the other hand, were things of beauty. On the first, Kaelen Walsh forechecked hard to gain possession in the Nationals' end before dumping it to the corner for Nathan Mason. The centreman whirled and fired a shot at the net. Right winger Maria Fernanda Pimentel was in position with her stick on the ice and tapped Mason's hard cross home for her second goal of the season.
The second goal was produced by some similarly determined forechecking with Zoe Read and Owen Askew doing the dirty work to get the puck to centreman James Nielsen who fired it home.
The only forwards who didn't get in on the scoring on the night were Connor Devlin and Troy Price, but they too had excellent games using their speed to give the Nationals' defenders fits in their end. Price had one full and another partial breakaway but was robbed by the Nationals' goaltender who played a very good game.
Not to be outdone Kayden Keating was his usual steady self in net providing assurance to his teammates that he would be there to make the saves when they needed him to be.
All in all, it was one of the finest efforts of the season from the Hawks who handed the Nationals just their second tie of the season to go along with just one loss.
Go Hawks go!