The Kenai River Brown Bears had a three-game winning streak snapped with a 4-2 loss to the Minot (North Dakota) Minotauros on Friday in North American Hockey League play.
There were 1,145 fans in spiffy Maysa Arena and Kenai River head coach Josh Petrich said the two teams put on a show to entertain the crowd.
“It was a back and forth game, a fun game to be a part of,” Petrich said. “It was two teams that are fast and compete, and we came up on the short end of the stick.”
Minot (3-1-1-0) of the Central Division and Kenai River (3-4-0-0) of the Midwest Division face off again today at 4:35 p.m. ADT.
Although the official scoresheet had Minot scoring just 13 seconds into the game, Petrich said the goal came four or five minutes into the first period. On Kenai River’s second shift of the game, the Bears had a goal called back due to a high stick.
“We got a goal called back, but we’ve got to be able to come back in the next few shifts,” Petrich said. “They were able to get a flurry in front.”
Austin Dollimer had the first-period goal, and Miroslav Mucha made it 2-0 for the Minotauros headed into the third period.
Kenai River cut the gap to 2-1 with 17 minutes, 1 second, left in the game when Luke Posner scored a power-play goal on assists from Luke Radetic and Sacha Guillemain. The Bears finished 1 for 6 on the man advantage.
With 8:24 to play, Minot went back up 3-1 on a goal by Grant Loven, but just over a minute later the Bears were back in business when Markuss Komuls scored on assists from Gil Garcia and Posner.
“Between the second and third periods, I told them there wouldn’t be any pretty goals and that they’d have to go to the dirty areas,” Petrich said. “They took four or five whacks at it and it popped out to the D and he put it over the goalie’s back.”
The Bears couldn’t find the equalizer, then gave up an empty-netter to Alex Adams with 40 seconds left.
Artur Pavliukov made 30 saves for the Bears, while Samu Lonkila had 21 for Minot.
“It was a good team effort, but in this league it’s tough to win on the road if you don’t compete for 60 minutes,” Petrich said. “We competed for 45 to 50 minutes.”
Friday
Minotauros 4, Brown Bears 2
Kenai River 0 0 2 — 2
Minot 1 1 2 — 4
First period — 1. Minot, Dollimer (Grounds, Dahl), 0:13. Penalties — Kenai River 1 for 2:00.
Second period — 2. Minot, Mucha (Talbot, Cochrane), 6:45. Penalties — Minot 1 for 2:00.
Third period — 3. Kenai River, Posner (Radetic, Guillemain), pp, 2:59; 4. Minot, Loven (McGinnis, Enns), 11:36; 5. Kenai River, Komuls (Garcia, Posner), 12:28; 6. Minot, Adams (Loven, Sawchuk), en, 19:20. Penalties — Kenai River 4 for 8:00; Minot 6 for 14:00.
Shots on goal — Kenai River 7-7-9—23; Minot 11-11-12—34.
Goalies — Kenai River, Pavliukov (33 shots, 30 saves); Minot, Lonkila (23 shots, 21 saves).
