Photos: Jeremy Seguin
FRENCH RIVER – An early two-goal lead proved to be enough for the Hearst Lumberjacks Saturday as then went on to defeat the French River Rapids 4-1 in Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League action at Noelville Arena.
Hearst gained the early edge with markers just over a minute apart midway through the opening frame.
Mathieu Comeau picked up the initial tally as he snapped a shot from the left circle past partially screened Ben Gustafson in the Rapids net.
Emile Pichette then made it 2-0 at 10:05 as he neatly redirected an Adam Shillinglaw point effort.
Cutting into the deficit four and a half minutes into the second stanza, Ryley Wolfe collected his initial NOJHL goal by firing one through traffic from up high in beating Lumberjacks’ goalkeeper Kaleb Papineau.
Getting that back half way through the contest, Andrew Morton came in on a two-on-one for the Lumberjacks and decided to shoot while ripping his attempt over the glove of Gustafson.
Third period play saw Jett Mintenko cap off the road triumph as he came in and stuffed a rebound into the net off an odd-man rush with just over seven minutes remaining.