MUSKEGON – You can generate a ton of offense, but if the pucks don’t go in the net, victories don’t occur.
That was the case for the Reeths-Puffer hockey team on Wednesday night in a very tough 3-2 loss to Grand Haven at Muskegon’s Trinity Health Arena.
The Rockets had a 34-18 advantage in shots on goal but could only get two past Grand Haven goalie Dean Mattson, who had a steady parade of great saves all night.
R-P suffered a huge blow in the second period when it had a 5-on-3 power play advantage, but instead of scoring an easy goal allowed Grand Haven’s Griffin Riemersma to steal the puck near the blue line and score on a breakaway.
The Rockets failed to score on any of their six power play opportunities, and in the end it all added up to a painful loss to a local rival.
“Their goalie definitely came up big for them tonight,” said R-P coach Ryan Martin. “It was a tough one. I feel like we outskated them, outshot them and it seemed like we had more puck possessions. There were a couple of goals there we would like to have back, but that’s hockey.”
While Reeths-Puffer is still off to a fine start to the season with a 6-4 overall record, Wednesday’s loss hurt because it was an O-K Conference Fisher Division game.
The Rockets fell to 1-2 in division play, and they only have 10 on the schedule, making next Tuesday’s home game against Northview a must-win if they hope to remain in championship contention.
“It’s an uphill battle from here,” Martin said. “Winning the conference championship is definitely a goal, but we’re going to need a little help along the way now.
“We haven’t lost back-to-back yet. After our first two losses we had an 8-0 win, and after our next loss we had an 8-1 win, so now we have to rebound again on Tuesday. That will be a good opportunity to get back in the win column and even up our conference record.”
The game was scoreless after one period, then the Rockets drew first blood when Jaxon Stone found the net at 5:02 of the second period, with assists from Eli Cuti and Tyler Tindall.
Riemersma tied the game for Grand Haven about two minutes later with a power play goal.
The Rockets had a very promising opportunity at 10:30 of the second period when two quick Grand Haven penalties gave them a 5-on-3 skater advantage for 57 seconds.
But R-P struggled on the power play, Riemersma stole the puck at the Rocket blue line, raced all the way down the ice alone and snuck a shot past Rocket goalie Tanner Bonjernoor, making the score 2-1.
The Rockets did just about everything they could to pull even in the third period, outshooting the Bucs 15-4, but again the puck did not bounce their way.
Grand Haven’s Royce Butler scored with 1:51 left in the game to make the score 3-1. Tindall scored for R-P with 1:38 remaining, with assists from Stone and Stawski, but the Rockets could not get the equalizer.
