Minot, ND – The Minotauros continued their pattern of bounce back wins on Saturday after dropping Friday’s contest to the St. Cloud Norsemen. In eight weekend series since the NAHL Showcase the Tauros have gone 1-7-0 in the first game of the weekend and 7-1-0 in the second game on Saturday.
This weekend on Friday the Tauros and Norsemen battled for over 50 minutes without either team scoring a goal. The Norsemen would finally open the scoring in a big way with Chase Freiermuth and Blake Perbix scoring just 31 seconds apart to turn what had been a scoreless draw into a 2-0 game stunning the home team and fans alike. The Norsemen would add two more including an empty netter while keeping the Tauros off the board completely getting Ethan Dahlmeir his first junior shutout on 22 saves.
Of course Saturday saw the Tauros bounce back. The Tauros offense was reignited first on the power play with Dean Schwenninger scoring 10:53 in the first period. Another power play marker just 38 seconds into the second, this time from Cole Mickel, made it 2-0 Tauros. David Nesburg scored less than a minute later for the Tauros third goal on their 11th shot ending Tomas Bolo’s night. Trevor Stachowiak kept the momentum going for the Tauros scoring at 5:19 of the period and Martin Friden finished a nice tic-tac-toe play from his twin Tom Friden and Braden Panzer at 12:29 to make it 5-0 Tauros.
Six seconds later, on the next whistle, five players: three Tauros and two Norsemen, earned 10 penalties for a total of 73 minutes. Ben Johnson accounted for 25 of the minutes getting a five minute major and a game misconduct for kicking. The Tauros would have to kill a five minute major to protect their five goal cushion. Zach Sandy and the Tauros killers would do just that and the Tauros took their five goal lead into the third. Sandy took over the rest of the way stopping 42 shots for his first junior shutout. Panzer would add the Tauros’ sixth of the night in the game’s final second for his first as a Tauro.
Next up, the Tauros head to Austin, MN, to take on the second place Bruins. The Tauros have taken three of the first four meetings from the Bruins including a weekend split in Austin the final weekend of September.