MUSKEGON, Mich – With playoff aspirations on the line, the Muskegon Lumberjacks began their three-game weekend with the first of two at the L.C. Walker Arena tonight against the Western Conference’s Des Moines Buccaneers. After a tightly-contested first period, the Lumberjacks used a three-goal second period to pull away and dictate 
the pace of play for the rest of regulation. Ultimately, Muskegon paved its way to a 5-1 triumph over the Buccaneers to reach a new team record for wins during a single season with their 3nd of the season surpassing the original mark set by the 2012-13 team of 31. Also, with regulation loses by both the Chicago Steel and Bloomington Thunder tonight on the road, the Lumberjacks officially clinched a spot in the Clark Cup Playoffs for the third time since joining the USHL five seasons ago.
The first period saw one goal notched courtesy of the host Lumberjacks (32-18-4, 68 points) grabbing an early 1-0 lead with 5:46 remaining in the opening frame courtesy of an unassisted tally from Griffen Molino splitting the Des Moines defense through the middle of the ice and sliding his 15th goal of the season through the five-hole of Ryland Pashovitz (13-10-5).
The Lumberjacks outshot the Buccaneers through the opening 20 minutes of regulation by a narrow 10-9 spread.
Early in the second period, Muskegon quickly doubled the lead to 2-0 just 1:22 into the middle frame as a point shot from Matej Paulovic found its way through traffic and past Pashovitz on the blocker side for his 16th of the year. Molino and Christian Wolanin helped set up the marker.
A few minutes later at the 4:05 mark, the Lumberjacks tripled the lead to 3-0 after a two-on-one opportunity led to Matheson Iacopelli feeding a streaking Mark Petaccio on the backdoor and in the low slot, who one-timed his tenth as a Lumberjack and 20th overall on the season.
The home team continued to pounce extending the spread to 4-0 at the 10:26 mark as Robbie DeMontis centered a backdoor feed of his own to a trailing Wolanin in the left faceoff circle, who went on to wrist his 13th marker of the season past the glove hand of Pashovitz. Joseph Cecconi also aided on the tally.
Just over three minutes later, the Buccaneers (21-20-13, 55 points) found their way to the scoreboard trimming the deficit to 4-1 at the 13:48 mark as a shot from the left point by Nick Wolff went on to get redirected in the low slot by Ara Nazarian out of midair and eventually crept its way through the five-hole of Eric Scheirhorn (24-12-4) for his 11th goal of the season. Ryan Dmowski received the secondary assist on the lone goal of the night for the visitors.
The three-goal margin held pat going into the second and final intermission break with Muskegon still holding on to the shot advantage by the slimmest of margins at 21-20 after both teams recorded 11 shots on goal each during the middle stanza.
The third period saw an add-on marker notched by the Lumberjacks to make it a 5-1 game at the 11:05 mark from Iacopelli blasting his team-leading 23rd of the season from inside the left faceoff circle off the left post and shooting into the back of the net. Bo Hanson helped on the goal.
The Iacopelli strike was the lone goal potted between both sides combined in the third as the hosts cruised to the four-goal victory with Des Moines ending up outshooting Muskegon for the game by a slim 29-27 advantage.
Eric Schierhorn earned his 24th victory of the season in net for the Lumberjacks stopping 28 of 29 shots faced, while Ryland Pashovitz took the road loss between the pipes following a 22-save night for the Buccaneers. Muskegon finished 1-for-3 on the man advantage, while Des Moines went 0-for-3. Three Lumberjacks in Christian Wolanin, Matheson Iacopelli, and Griffen Molino led the offensive attack with a goal and an assist each. Five others contributed to Muskegon’s offense with a point apiece. With his two-point night, Iacopelli has now reached 64 goals and 98 points for his USHL career, while Molino has reached the 95-point mark during his current two-year tenure in the league. Muskegon has won the last three regular season matchups against Des Moines dating back to last season.
With Lumberjacks game report
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