By Kevin Scott
| Box Score | Game Sheet | League Scoreboard | Americans Team Statistics |
GREAT FALLS, Mont., October 6, 2017 — The Great Falls Americans met the visiting Missoula Jr. Bruins for the first time this season when they both collided on the ice at the Great Falls Ice Plex on Friday night.
Great Falls, playing in their fourth year in the North American 3 Hockey League (NA3HL), had four different players find the back of the net as they came away with a 4-2 win over the Junior Bruins of Missoula, Montana on Friday evening.
Alaska native Matt Larson put the home team up 1-0 after the opening period. His score with 7:27 remaining in the period was assisted by Michael Fary and Ben Rinckey. Great Falls took 21 shots on the period while holding the Bruins to 6.
Missoula bounced back and took a 2-1 lead thanks to a pair of goals by Misha Akatnov during the first five minutes of the second period. CJ Oldin, Hayden Moistner and Rhys Cottle provided the assists. Kyler Mack, the 5’9” forward, evened up the score at 2-2 before the middle period concluded with Garrett Peters getting his first assist of the season.
After Matt Janke scored his fourth goal in sixth games to pull the Americans ahead on the power play, Payton McSharry took advantage of the short-handed Bruins to provide the final goal of the contest at the 10:45 mark of the final stanza.
Great Falls committed just three minor penalties (6 minutes of penalty time) and Missoula had five infractions all in the final two periods.
The Americans dominated the shots-on-goal category by having 32 of their total 52 during the opening forty minutes of play. Missoula took 28 shots connecting on two successful scoring opportunities.
Mack Willy had another successful game in the net for the host team. The Tacoma, Washington native stopped 26 of the 28 shot attempts made by the Bruins offense. Brian Thomas picked up the loss for the visitors ended the contest with 26 saves.
NEXT CONTEST: Great Falls will visit Bozeman, Montana for the first time this season on Saturday, October 7th. Game time is set for 7:30PM from Haynes Pavilion.