Jacks split another pair of weekend games

OT loss to Tavistock followed by spanking of Burford as Wellesley runs record to 2-2

IT WAS ANOTHER WIN and a loss for the Wellesley Applejacks, as last weekend mirrored the results of the one before.

After falling 3-2 to the Tavistock Braves on Friday night, the Jacks went into Burford Sunday and tamed the Bulldogs 11-2.

Four games into the new season, the team has a record of 2-2, putting them in fourth place in the South Doherty division standings, just behind the New Hamburg Firebirds. The Paris Mounties are in first place, with the Tavistock Braves in second.

The results of this weekend are also notably similar to that of their two previous games: a close one, but an eventual loss in overtime for their first game (to the Norwich Merchants 5-4 on Sept. 14), and their next game with a sizeable win (against the Delhi Travellers 15-0 on Sept. 15).

It started off on a good note in their first game against Tavistock on September 21, with Tyler Schwindt (Mitchell Booth, Peter Cascagnette) drawing first blood around the 6-minute mark. Tavistock returned the favour with twice the force during the second period, coming back with two consecutive goals within five minutes of each other.

Wellesley wasn’t going down without a fight, tying up the score at 2-2 with a goal by Warren Gorman (Alex Uttley, James Ranson) on a power play before the end of the second period. The final period remained competitive but quiet, with no goals from either team, leading the game into overtime.

While there was some brief back and forth, it was Tavistock who managed to claim victory 40 seconds into overtime, with an unassisted goal by Zack Otto.

Despite the previous day, the next game on Saturday proved to be much more successful for the Applejacks, with two goals being scored in under a minute in their away game against the Burford Bulldogs. Uttley (Reade MacInnes, Cascagnette) and Schwindt (Ranson) managed to gain the upper hand before the Bulldogs came back about five minutes later.

The Applejacks didn’t let this deter them, however, continuously racking up the points throughout the first period with a goal by MacInnes (Schwindt, Cascagnette) and Brendan Baker (Robert Colton, Ranson), making the score 5-1 by the end of the period.

The Bulldogs managed to get one more goal in at the beginning of the second period before the Applejacks unleashed a scoring frenzy on the team, scoring four more goals by the end of the second period. Among the scorers were Uttley (Schwindt) at the 9-minute mark, followed by Will Martin (Colton, Baker) less than a minute later.

Alternating between a goal and assist for the last half were Colton (Baker) and Baker (Colton), bringing the score up to 8-2 by the end of the second intermission. The team managed to keep the momentum going for the last period, with Sean Pickering (Cascagnette, MacInnes) scoring, and Pickering (Gorman) again at 12 minutes. The final goal to bring the team up to a dramatic win was by Jordan Hoekstra (Schwindt, Zach Ribeiro).

Hoping to keep up with the dramatic wins, the Applejacks will continue playing away games for the next couple of weeks. Fans can catch the team a little closer to home, however, as their next game September 28 at the Wilmot Arena against the New Hamburg Firebirds. Game time is 7:30 p.m.