Generals outduel Thunder in battle of former rivals
Despite no longer being division rivals in the Heritage Junior Hockey League (HJHL), the Cochrane Generals and the Airdrie Thunder still play an intense brand of hockey when the two teams meet.
Generals’ forward Jonny Pictin had a hat trick, while Riley Boothby added two goals, as Cochrane used a four-goal third-period outburst to outlast Airdrie 7-3 at the Spray Lakes Sawmills Family Sports Centre, Jan. 14.
“The game hasn’t lost any of its luster, even though we’re not in the same division anymore,” said Generals’ assistant coach Tanner Boothby. “There’s something about Airdrie and Cochrane that always brings out the nastiness.”
Nick Borody and Chris Hugo had the other goals for Cochrane, while netminder Brady Markham made 39 saves for the win. Brandon Esposito, Alex Hustad and Marcus Cheng had the Airdrie goals, with Cody Boeckman making 44 saves in net.
“For two periods, I think we outplayed them, but we had a rash of penalties and injuries that put us down to three defencemen,” said Thunder assistant coach Gareth Barley of the game that featured 106 penalty minutes.
“We had a lot of key players missing from the lineup, but it’s no excuse for the final outcome. They dominated the third period.”
“We were tied 3-3 after the second and we were just kind of hanging in there,” Boothby said. “We weren’t really getting any bounces, then in the third we started to. They’re a team that likes to capitalize on the power play. They keep it simple and wait for you to haul them down. But we cleaned it up in the third.”
Cochrane, 21W-8-2L on the season, dropped a 6-1 loss to Okotoks a day earlier. As of Rocky View Weekly press time, the Generals trailed the Bisons by seven points, with one game in hand.
The team played host to Banff on Jan. 20 and Stettler on Jan. 21. It will visit the High River Flyers on Jan. 27 before hosting the Three Hills Thrashers in its next home game, Jan. 28.
The puck drop is at 7:30 p.m. at the Spray Lakes Sawmills Family Sports Centre
“We’re going to try and catch Okotoks, but I don’t know if we’ll be able to,” Boothby said of his team’s upcoming schedule. “We’re also looking forward to the playoff and gearing our practices up accordingly.”
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