Adam Prudhomme
Editor
For most Junior C hockey teams, two loses in a row would barely register as a blip over the course of a full season.
When a team had won all 16 of their prior matches before dropping two in a row-such is the case of the Napanee Raiders-it tends to stand out a bit more. The Raiders followed up Friday’s 3-2 home loss to the Picton Pirates on Friday night with a 7-4 road defeat at the hands of the Amherstview Jets on Sunday.
Napanee appeared to be starting out on the right skate in Sunday’s matinee when Noah Westwater got them on the board just 2:34 into the game.
Any positive vibes were quickly erased however as Amherstview’s Zackery McMahon, Eric Russell, Josh Kudo and Jack Wiley all scored within a 13 minute span, swinging the score 4-1 in the Jets’ favour in the process. The three-goal hole represented the biggest deficit the Raiders had faced all season.
The second period saw no advantage for either team as both sides added two goals to their tally. Nicholas Goosney and Cam Krupa scored for Napanee, bookending goals from Amherstview’s Kudo and Nolan Stevenson.
Krupa got the Raiders to within two with a goal in the third only to see Kudo score his third of the game just over two minutes later, both goals coming on the power-play.
Aidan Thomson earned the win with 34 saves while Bailey Maracle lost his second straight decision, allowing all seven goals on 35 shots.
Napanee’s mini stumble coupled with the Jets win has whittled the Raiders’ division lead down to five points. Napanee’s 16-2 record gives them 32 points on the year while the second place Jets are now 13-6-1 on the year with 27 points. Picton is third at 9-6 (18 points), Frankford fourth at 6-10 (12 points), Port Hope fifth at 4-8-2 (10) with Campbellford last at 0-12-1 (one).
Napanee will look to snap their mini funk on Friday when they welcome the Frankford Huskies to the SPC for a 7:30 p.m. puck drop for their lone game of the week.