The Johnstown Tomahawks beat the Aston Rebels 4-3 for the first time in four regular season tries last night in a fight filled game. It was the first of two back-to-back games between the two being played at the Cambria County War Memorial Arena.
Johnstown opened the scoring at the 3:32 mark of the first period when Brendan Jaquay beat Rebels goalie Darion Hanson. It was the third goal of the year for the Lansdale, PA native.
The Rebels tied it when defenseman Jerry Miettuen took a feed from Ryan Cusin and Drew Blackmun and beat Tomahawks goalie Ryan Glander on a power play goal at 7:51. The lead didn’t last long when Alex Alger took a pass from Andrew Romano and beat Hanson only four seconds after the Rebels had just tied the game. It was a power play goal for the home team. Rebels away captain Austin Swingle then tied the game at 13:15 of the opening stanza with a nice feed from Chris Deprez.
After the Rebels were called for a delay of game penalty, Johnstown went on the attack when Kelly O’Brien scored his tenth goal of the season beating Hanson on the power player. The game then got physical when the Hawks Tommy Horn decided to take on Connor Wood and lost.
With the Hawks entering the final period with a 3-2 lead, Swingle tied the game 5:09 seconds with a nice setup from Deprez and Gvido Jansons. Six minutes later Swingle then took on Logan Hudson and beat him in a fight. The Rebels had just finished killing off Evgeny Yakovlev’s cross-checking penalty when the Hawks Dalton Hunter received a pass from Anthony Parrucci and scored putting the Hawks in the lead at 4-3. The game’s fourth fight then took place when Miettueten took on Jaquay.
The Rebels had their chances in the final moments when Johnstown’s Zak Galambos took a cross checking penalty with forty two seconds left in the game. Despite throwing rubber at Glander, the Rebels weren’t able to get it by him as the Tomahawks held on to win the game. Click here for the box score.
The two teams are at it again tonight at 7:00pm at the War Memorial.
