Photos: Northern Lights Photography
HEARST, Ont. – On a milestone night, Mathieu Comeau collected two assists, while Kadin Bilajbegovic picked up his first two goals, including the game-winner, as the Hearst Lumberjacks defeated the French River Rapids 7-3 Saturday in a Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League match-up at Claude Larose Recreation Centre.
Appearing in his 244th NOJHL contest, Comeau moves into second-spot all-time in regular season games played, passing former North Bay Skyhawks and Sudbury Jr. Wolves forward Chris Pontes and the 243 games that he suited up in from 2004-10.
Wasting little time in collecting his 285th NOJHL point, Comeau, the Hearst captain, drew a helper on the night’s initial tally as he set-up Mavrick Chan-Miguel going to the net as he beat French River starter Matis Bureau-Morel 66 seconds into the proceedings.
Ty McKay then made it 2-0 on the next shift on an odd-man rush and from the top of the crease as he whipped in a Luc Warner pass.
That saw the guests opt to make a goaltending change as Ethan Madden entered in early relief.
The Lumberjacks kept coming though as Warner extended the early cushion with a marker at 4:49 when he slid in a low shot off a dish from the point from Cole Miller.
Trading tallies after that, both the Rapids’ Quinn Habermehl and the Jacks’ Bilajbegovic both notched their initial league tallies to make it 4-1.
Habermehl got his goal by stuffing in a rebound off a Jack Wilson shot past Hearst starter Jack Helkie.
Bilajbegovic then picked up his first when he ripped one in from distance from the right point.
Heading to the middle stanza, Wilson got another one for the visitors as he scooped up a Joey Stiles attempt in close and neatly spun and slid one past the outstretched pad of Helkie.
Another from Bilajbegovic saw him roof a loose puck laying at the side of the crease midway through the contest to put the hosts up 5-2 in eluding Bureau-Morel, who had come back in to begin the period.
Some solid work from Bureau-Morel kept his club in it, into the third period.
There, Chase Thompson reached the 20-goal mark on the campaign as he ripped in a dish from Chan-Miguel at 7:10.
Still battling, Nolan McVeigh buried a short side screen shot on the power play for French River’s third of the evening, with six and a half minutes to go.
Hearst’s Hugo Allard then found an open corner for his seventh in the late going to round out the scoring.
Both squads are back at it Sunday as the Rapids travel to Timmins for a 1 p.m. matinee with the Rock while the Lumberjacks welcome the Iroquois Falls Storm in a 7 p.m. face-off back at Claude Larose.
