The Lincoln Stars snap the 11 game losing streak, and win big over the Sioux Falls Stampede by a score of 7-3 on Saturday afternoon in Sioux Falls.
Lincoln (4-12-0-2) scored in the first period and did not look back. A solid finish to the first period propelled Lincoln to a four goal second period. Ethan Weber, Jared Mangan, and a hat trick from Keaton Peters led the Stars to a 7-3 victory.
Sioux Falls (10-8-1-1) struggled in the second period, taking four penalties including a penalty on Artur Cholach which was a five minute major for boarding and a ten minute game misconduct.
Lincoln opened the scoring when Keaton Peters scored on a breakaway shorthanded after a penalty on Justin Varner for holding. The Stars would hold the lead for five minutes until J.J. Wiebusch tied the game 1-1. Egor Barbanov of the Stampede would take a penalty in the last two minutes of the first period which gave Lincoln the man advantage heading into the second period.
Blake Montgomery would get the scoring going in the second period off of a nice feed from Jared Mangan behind the net to make it 2-1. A couple of minutes later Ryan Spinale would score his first USHL goal and first goal as a Lincoln Stars from Jared Mangan and Adam Kleber to make it 3-1 on the Power Play. Artur Cholach received a five minute major boarding call and a ten minute game misconduct which would lead to 4 on 4 hockey after Max Ferkodic took a penalty for interference. Four on four hockey would lead to an Ethan Weber goal off of a nice pass in the slot from Kai Janviriya to make it 4-1 and for Weber that would be his first USHL goal and first goal as a Lincoln Star. Just minutes later Jack Pechar would join the scoring frenzy in the second period and make it 5-1 Lincoln. Lincoln would go into the last twenty minutes of hockey up four goals on Sioux Falls.
Keaton Peters would score his second goal of the night on the power play on a feed from Blake Montgomery. This goal would come from a Kazimier Sobieski tripping penalty at the eight minute mark of the 3rd period. It would now be 6-1. Kai Janviriya took an illegal equipment penalty as his helmet came off on the ice and he stayed on the ice. This penalty would lead to a Sioux Falls power play goal from John McNelis to make it 6-2 Lincoln, Two minutes and eight seconds later Jake Toll would score the second goal of the third period for the Stampede on a pass from Michah Berger. The Stampede now made it a 6-3 hockey game. Keaton Peters with less than twenty seconds to go in the period would fire the puck from beyond the blue line and score an empty netter and make the score 7-3 while scoring his 3rd goal for a Hat Trick.
The Stars snap the eleven game losing streak and defeat the Stampede by a score of 7-3. The Stars head to Omaha tomorrow night to take on the Lancers for round two of the rivalry. Puck drop tomorrow will be at 6:05pm in Omaha.
