The Twin City Thunder opened up the Islanders Hockey Club Showcase in North Andover, Massachusetts, with a pair of wins, starting with a 6-4 victory over the Dells Ducks on Thursday morning.
Six different goal scorers found the back of the net for the Thunder, Derric Trudeau leading the way with a goal and an assist. Jeromey Rancourt had two assists in the victory.
“We talked about this last week when we weren’t getting that scoring,” Thunder coach Doug Friedman said. “Today, for example, we got great goals from (Alex) Schneider and Trudeau. Matt Jolicour made a great play. It was nice to see (from) him, he blocked a shot in the defensive zone and went on a breakaway and scored. That’s his game, he (has) good speed and he plays solid defense. He’s a defenseman that has transitioned to a forward. He has taken that on and done great.”
Schneider opened the scoring 2:10 in the opening period, and Jolicour scored his first goal of the season 87 seconds later to make it 2-0 for Twin City.
The Ducks responded 16 seconds later at the 3:53 mark when Colton Maynard lit the lamp.
Trudeau scored the Thunder’s first power-play goal at the 9:27 mark of the first period, and Cody Doyon scored with 4:58 remaining in the period to give Twin City a 4-1 lead after 20 minutes.
Zachary Desmarais stretched the lead to 5-1 just past the eight-minute mark of the second period on the power play.
Dells made a pushback in the second half of the middle fame. First, James Heard scored at the midway point, with Stone Stelzl picking up the lone assist. Stelzl added his team-leading 10th goal of the season four minutes later to cut the deficit to 5-3.
Nolan Echols scored at the 3:36 mark of the third period for the Ducks before Etienne Crousle scored the Thunder’s third power-play goal of the games for an insurance tally at the five-minute mark.
The Thunder then held off the Ducks in the final five minutes.
“Overall, our penalty kill did a good job because they had five-minute penalty kill to finish the game,” Friedman said. “We probably gave up one or two chances on that. We did a real good job with that because it could have gone against our favor there.”
Jaxon Friedman made 20 saves for the victory. Dells’ Michael Zeleney also made 20 saves in the loss.
Twin City 3, Minnesota 0
In the second game of the day, the Thunder defeated the Minnesota Mulletts 3-0.
Nicolas Poirier had Cody Doyon each had a goal and an assist to lead the Thunder. Alex Schneider added a goal.
The Thunder return to action at the showcase Sunday night against the DME Swamp Rabbits at 7:30 p.m., and cap the showcase off on Monday morning against the Pittsburgh Vengeance.
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