Golden Hawks fall to Pickering Panthers

The Trenton Golden Hawks and Pickering Panthers face off at the Duncan McDonald Memorial Community Gardens in Trenton. Photo by Jenna Leslie, QNet News

By Jenna Leslie

BELLEVILLE – The Pickering Panthers defeated the Golden Hawks 4-2 on Tuesday night in Trenton. 

The Panthers scored on their second shot of the game at 5:41 into the first period. Andrew Poulias of Pickering got the goal, while Davis Teigen-Katsumi and Andrew Hughes tallied the only two assists for the Panthers.

Andrew Hughes got a second, unassisted goal for the Panthers at 12:43 into the first.

“They’re a fast team and they like to stretch it out and sometimes that gets the better of us,” said Golden Hawks forward and leading scorer, Max Ewart.

While there was no scoring in the second period, there were many penalties called on both teams. The Golden Hawks racked up 16 penalty minutes in the second period alone, while the Panthers were in the box for a total of ten.

“A big part of our loss tonight was untimely, undisciplined penalties,” said Golden Hawks coach, Marty Abrams. In total, the Golden Hawks received 26 minutes of penalties throughout the game.

Among the penalties was a ten-minute head-contact misconduct call on Trenton’s Shawn Guison.

The Golden Hawks pushed hard in the third, scoring two goals.

Rex Moe scored the first at 9:32, with Tiger McDonald tallying the assist.

However, Pickering returned with a power-play goal by Andrew Hughes after Trenton’s Scoley Dow received two minutes for slashing.

With less than a minute left, Caleb Boman got a pass from Max Ewart and got a shot off, making the score 3-2.

However, the Panthers sealed the deal with an empty-netter with only ten seconds left in the game.

The win put the Panthers up on the Golden Hawks by one point in the overall league standings.

Pickering’s goalie was one of the major hurdles in the game. Ethan Langevine let in only two of the 35 shots he faced throughout the game.

“You always have to recognize and appreciate when an opposing player plays a good game and he played a fantastic game,” said Ewart of Langevine.

The Golden Hawks will be back at home on Friday to take on the Kingston Voyageurs.

Right now, Trenton is trailing Kingston by nine points in the standings, having played two more games than Kingston.

“We’ve struggled against Kingston all year, there’s no question about it. They have a high-octane offence, they’re very fast, they move the puck well and they have a good power play. So we know what we’re up against and we’ll have to be ready and we’ll have to play better than we did tonight,” said Abrams.

“I expect another hard game but we’re going to be ready and we’re going to be coming out flying,” said Ewart of Friday’s game.

Puck drop is at 7:30 p.m. at the Duncan McDonald Memorial Community Gardens.