Nationals face a rough start

This past weekend was a busy one as far as sports were concerned in Havre, and one of the events that capped off another exciting Festival Days weekend, was the Glacier Nationals home-opener Saturday night inside the Havre Ice Dome.

Unfortunately for the Nationals and their fans, the home debut did not go as well as they hoped as the Helena Bighorns, one of the top teams in the Frontier Division of the North American Tier 3 Hockey League, defeated Glacier 7-1.

In front of a good crowd that packed the Ice Dome, the Bighorns came out firing and scored twice in the first period to grab a 2-0 advantage. In the second period, Helena continued to overwhelm the Glacier defense with shots on goal and eventually got two more across the red line, which gave the Bighorns a 4-0 lead going into the third period.

The third period saw more of the same as Riley Keays scored his second goal of the night to put Helena in front 5-0. Down 6-0 and with 5:30 left in the game, the Nationals finally got on the board when Tyler McMahon, the team’s top goal-scorer from a season ago, found the back of the net thanks to an assist from Marvin Simmons. Helena would tack on a goal to make the final score 7-1.

The Bighorns finished the game with a total of 44 shot attempts, while Glacier managed to get just 25. Adam Ranck earned the win in net for Helena with 24 saves, while Ben Perone got the loss for the Nationals, despite finishing the game with 37 saves.

Glacier may have played its first home game of the season in Havre Saturday night, but the Nationals opened the season Friday night in Great Falls against the mighty Great Falls Americans.

For years, the Americans have been one of the better teams in the Frontier and they showed why again Friday night as they scored six goals in the opening period on their way to notching a 12-1 victory over Glacier.

The Americans had six different players score in the first period and eight had players score throughout the game. Yet, no player had a more impressive night than Brendan Jester, who posted a hat-trick in the win for Great Falls. Jesse Johnson also scored two goals for the Americans.

One of the few bright spots on the night for Glacier was the late goal scored by Tanner Poker, who scored on a power-play for the Nationals with just 1:37 left in the game. He was assisted by Collin Schieman and Ronald Robertson.

Once again, Glacier was dominated in the category of shots on goal as the Americans had 56 compared to just 21 for the Nationals. Lauren Massie got the win for the Americans after turning away 20 of 21 shot attempts from Glacier. Mikhail Pahrebets got the loss after allowing 10 goals on 39 shots. Ryall Purdy also saw time in net for the Nationals and surrendered two goals on 19 shot attempts.

The Nationals (0-2) will be back in action this weekend, when they will hit the road for back-to-back games in Gillette, Wyoming, against the Gillette Wild. Both games will take place at 7 p.m.