MEDFORD HOCKEY - Northwest Icemen thaw from scoring slump, beat Raiders 8-2

MEDFORD HOCKEY

Facing a team it felt it could play with and beat, things turned on Medford's hockey team Friday with a run of five goals from the Northwest Icemen, who got their second win of the season with an 8-2 win over the visiting Raiders.

Ethan Peterson and Gavin Lehmann each recorded hat tricks for the Barronbased co-op, who broke out offensively after averaging less than two goals per game in their first seven contests. In fact, they had one or no goals in five of those games.

But sometimes all it takes is one to get a team going. For the Icemen, it was Peterson who broke the seal Friday with two first-period goals to counter Tucker Phillips' opening goal for the Raiders. Phillips scored just 54 seconds into the game with assists from Jacob Doyle and Grady Crass. Medford's lead lasted about three minutes. On Medford's only penalty of the game, Peterson got the power-play goal with assists from Lehmann and David Pond to tie the game at the 3:56 mark.

Peterson put the Icemen up 2-1 at the 6:19 mark and Braydon Roberts made it 3-1 at 12:14 with assists from Noah Nelson and Lehmann. Northwest outshot Medford in a dominant first period 20-4 with Talan Albers making 17 saves in between the pipes for Medford.

Lehmann scored his first goals 2:27 into the second period, assisted by Pond and Roberts. Peterson capped his hat trick at 10:17 with Pond's third assist of the night to make it 5-1.

Phillips got his second goal of the game and team-leading ninth of the season for Medford at 13:18.

But Pond scored 5:42 into the third period and Lehmann got his last two goals with a short-hander at 10:32 and another with 43 seconds left. Pond had the assists on both for a game total of five.

Albers had 27 saves for Medford. The Raiders did tighten things up on the defensive end, allowing just 15 shots in the final two periods. Caleb Parker collected 23 saves for the Icemen, including 11 in the third period.

While the Iceman converted on their only power play, Medford was unable to take advantage of Northwest's five penalties, including allowing the shorthanded goal on the last one.

'We're still struggling to play games how we practice and do the things in games like we do them in practice,' Medford head coach Klayton Kree said. “We show glimpses here and there, but we're still not putting it together.'

Now 1-10, Medford gets a rematch with the team it beat, the Chequamegon Co-op, Friday at 7 p.m. at the Simek Recreation Center. Next week is a busy one for the Raiders who host Waupaca in Great Northern Conference play Monday at 7 p.m., host Spooner-Shell Lake in nonconference play Tuesday at 6 p.m. and then head to the Merrill Co-op’s annual tournament Jan. 10-11.