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Americans blank Nationals

After getting drubbed by the Great Falls Americans 14-0 last Thursday in Great Falls, the Glacier Nationals returned home, facing the same team and hoping for a different result.

And Glacier, which hosted the Americans Friday night inside the Havre Ice Dome, did get a slightly different result. It was still a loss, as Great Falls won the game 5-0, but the Nationals were much more competitive, keeping within striking distance for much of the game.

Thursday night, Great Falls scored nine goals in the opening period in their win over the Nationals, but Friday night, in Havre, Great Falls scored just once in the first period thanks to a goal by Sandis Mezharaups, who beat Nationals goalie Brendan Schultz.

The score remained 1-0 in favor of Great Falls until 5:42 into the second period, when the Americans struck again, this time via Michal Fary, who scored his first goal of the season. Malachi Bushey added another around seven minutes later and with eight seconds left in the stanza, the Americans got another goal, this time from Tanner Congdon, to make the score 4-0 with 20 minutes remaining.

In third period, the two teams played to a standstill for the first 10 minutes, before Matt Janke scored to extend the Great Falls advantage to 5-0. The Nationals, who managed just 15 shots in the game and three in the final period, ended the game without a goal.

Kyler Ayers got the win in net for the Americans, as he stopped all 15 shots that he faced. Schultz was hit with the loss for the Nationals after allowing five goals on 61 Great Falls shots.

With the win, Great Falls improved to 15-3-1 on the season. The Americans sit in second place, six points back of the Yellowstone Quake, who have 39. Gillette is in third with 31, followed by Missoula with 29 and Bozeman with 26. Helena has 15 and Billings has nine. After the loss, the Nationals are now winless in their last 14 outings. Their record is 1-21-1 and they have three points, which puts them in last place in the Frontier Standings.

Glacier will be on the road this week for back-to-back games against Missoula Friday and Saturday.

 

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