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NAHL U.S. National Team

U.S. National Under-18 Falls to Traverse City in Overtime, 4-3

January 12, 2007 - North American Hockey League (NAHL)
U.S. National Team News Release


ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- The U.S. National Under-18 Team lost a heart-breaker to the Traverse City North Stars, 4-3 in overtime tonight at the Ann Arbor Ice Cube.

U.S. forward John Albert (Concord, Ohio) opened the scoring tonight when he beat Traverse City netminder Stefan Shively with a backhand shot to the far side of the net from the bottom of the left circle. Traverse City evened the score with nine seconds remaining in the opening period when Zach Hitch notched a power-play goal when he fired a shot through a crowd in front of U.S. netminder Josh Unice (Toledo, Ohio) to tie the game at 1-1.

Ryan Hayes (Syracuse, N.Y.) gave the U.S. the 2-1 advantage 13:24 into the second period when he danced his way through the North Stars zone and beat Shively along the ice. Team USA stretched the lead to 3-1 with 36 seconds remaining in the second period when Colin Wilson (Greenwich, Conn.) walked into a open spot in the Traverse City zone and buried a wristshot over the right shoulder of Shively to give the U.S. the 3-1 advantage after two periods.

Traverse City cut the U.S. lead to one with 2:41 remaining in the game when Harrison Nieman converted on a two-on-one rush to make it a 3-2 game. With 1.8 seconds remaining in the game the U.S. was whistled for icing after Albert missed an empty net. Traverse City defenseman Nick Von Bokern one-timed the puck as it hit the ice on the face-off right into the upper right corner of the U.S. net to send the game into overtime.

In the extra period U.S. defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk (New Rochelle, N.Y.) was whistled for holding with 3:16 remaining in the extra frame. Traverse City scored 1:47 into the power-play to win the game.

The U.S. National Under-18 Team will face Traverse City tomorrow night (Jan. 12) at 7 p.m. EST at the Ice Cube in a re-match of tonight's battle.

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