9-29-17 at Minnesota Moose
The Minnesota Blue Ox have an impressive second and third period to complete comeback and push past the Minnesota Moose 6-3.
By Meghann Norrbom
The Moose took an early 1-0 lead at 9:06 of the opening period when a shot from Gast slipped past Blue Ox goalie Brady Boudreau. The Moose furthered their lead, in the first, when a pass from Anderson and Krasny to Keays at 16:03 found the net to increase the Moose’s lead to 2-0 after the first period.
The Moose would score their final goal of the night, in the second period, when a pass from Jones found Gast putting the Moose’s lead up to 3-0. The Minnesota Blue Ox started their comeback at 14:57 of the second when Kristian Kause would find the net for the first goal of the night. And two minutes later, Blue Ox Tyler Dupuy from Chris Ciolek would find the net again giving the Ox their second goal of the night. A late period penalty for cross checking would put the Blue Ox on a power play. Forward Philip Schader would take full advantage of that power play and sneak one past the Moose at 19:59 of the second period with the assists from Mueller and Halme.
The Blue Ox and the Moose would start the third period tied 3-3, but all the momentum seemed to be with the Ox coming out of a strong second period. Blue Ox, Daniel Nikiforov, proved to keep the strong momentum from the second going as he nabbed a pass from teammate Halme to give the Ox the first lead of the night. The Ox didn’t look back from there as Orlando Scherz wristed a pass from Halme and Kause to increase the Ox’s lead to 5-3. At 11:07 of the third, Oskari Halme, scored his first goal of the night with assists going to Luca Perret and Orlando Scherz, adding to an already impressive third period for the Minnesota Blue Ox.
The Blue Ox owned a 58-26 advantage in shots on goal and converted one of four power play chances in their win. Brady Boudreau got the W, to go 3 and 0 on the season in nets for the Blue Oxen of Minnesota.
Coach Witta had this to say after the emotional win, “The fellas showed a lot of character tonight. I was impressed with their compete to win on the bench, after each goal we had scored against us. We have a mantra on this team – and in life, you can never give up, ever. We have talked about Tom Brady in this past years Superbowl. Down 28-3 at half, and the guy comes out to stage the biggest comeback in Super Bowl history. That takes a very strong positive mindset to do – to keep battling when things are not going your way. Leaders do that. This is a big win mentally for us, which will really help us as the season progresses.”
The Minnesota Blue Ox are now 5-0 on the season and will continue play on October 13th against the Detroit Fighting Irish in the first game of the Chicago Showcase.