Campbell’s six-point effort leads Express past Warriors

POWNAL – A six-point night by Ross Campbell sparked the Eastern Express to a 7-5 victory over the Prince County Warriors in a head-to-head clash between the top two teams in the P.E.I. Major Under-15 AAA Hockey League at the Pownal Sports Centre on Thursday night.

Campbell, who has a league-leading 54 points in 13 regular-season games, netted a hat trick and added three assists as the Express improved to 12-0-1 (won-lost-overtime losses). The O’Leary-based Warriors dropped to 10-5-0.

Mason Power (2-1), Drew MacDonald and Owen MacPherson also scored for the Express. Dawson Sharkey (3), Ryan Dwyer, Carson MacKenzie, Matthew MacLean and Evan Nicholson earned assists.

Ethan Dickson (3-1), who is second in the league scoring race with 47 points in 15 contests, and Carson Griffin (1-3) each had four points to pace Prince County’s offence. Colby Hudson added a single tally while assists went to Will Murphy, Andrew Thompson and Lincoln Waugh.

The teams were tied 2-2 after the first period and 4-4 following two. Each team held a pair of one-goal leads through the first 40 minutes in the back-and-forth contest.

Jackson MacDonald stopped 28 of 33 shots in earning the goaltending win. Cole Echlin turned aside 41 of 48 shots for the Warriors.

The Warriors were scheduled to host the Mid-Isle Matrix (3-11-0) at the O’Leary Community Sports Centre on Friday at 7:30 p.m. The Express returns to action on Saturday at MacLauchlan Arena in Charlottetown against the host Central Attack (2-10-0) at 1:30 p.m.