Dom Garcia and Gvido Jansons combined for five points last night to lead the Rebels to a 5 – 1 victory of the visiting New Jersey Titans during the team’s military appreciation weekend. It was the first of a three game series between the two teams.
Garcia, ironically, started the night off on the wrong skate (so to speak). At 4:12 into the first period he was called for interference putting the Titans on the power play. With time winding down on New Jersey’s man advantage, Andrew Bellant was covering the top near side point. He cut off an errant pass and started to break out of the zone. He bounced the puck off the boards and went around the Titans defender and picked up the passed and walked in on Titans goalie Harrison Feeney and beat him short side to give the Rebels a 1 – 0 at the 6:09 mark of the opening period.
With the Rebels on top to start the second, New Jersey tied the game only 2:44 into the period on a very odd play. After Gianluca Esteves dumped the puck into the Titans zone, New Jersey’s Spencer Stanley head man the puck to Victor Ostling. Ostling had a burst of speed and walked in on Rebels goalie Mareks Mitens. Ostling took a shot that was saved by Mitens but the puck very slowly inched towards the goal line. It had appeared the Esteves had swiped the puck out of the net while Nick Boyagian was taking a swipe at it. Although the goal light did not go on, the referee had said the slow gliding puck crossed the red line to put the Titans on the board to tie the game.
Then almost two minutes later Titans’ forward Danny Eruzione was called for charging putting the Rebels on the power play. Brennan Kapcheck had control of the puck at the top of the face off circle in New Jersey’s zone. As he was falling down, Kapcheck passed the puck back to Jansons. Jansons passed it to Aaron Maguyon at the top of the far size faceoff circle. Maguyon sent it back to Jansons who took a slapshot that was redirected by Garcia passed Feeney to give the Rebels a 2 – 1 with 15:01 left in the second period.
With Dustin Manz aggressively forechecking in the Titans zone, he went behind New Jersey’s and stripped the puck off of a Titans defenseman. Manz brought the puck around the net and sent a beautiful pass out front to a wide open Carter Woolley who one-timed it passed Feeney for this fifth goal of the season at the 10:04 mark of the second period.
With forty nine seconds left in the second period, Jansons had the puck at the top of the near side point. He passed it down low to Jensen Zerban. Zerban skated around the net and passed it out into the slot to Kapcheck who beat Feeney long side to give the Rebels a 4 – 1 lead.
Garcia would score his second goal on the night (and second on the power play) when he picked up a big rebound off a Bellant shot and put it past Feeney for the Rebels fifth and final goal. Jansons had three assists on the evening.
Mitens stopped 25 of 26 shots he faced while Feeney turned aside 25 of 30. Click here for the box score.
The middle game of this three game series will be played tonight at IceWorks with the game time starting at 7:00pm.
