SAVANNAH, GA – Craig Martin and Garrett Van Wyhe each scored twice to help guide the Jacksonville Icemen to a 6-5 road win over the Savannah Ghost Pirates Thursday evening at Enmarket Arena.
Just before the three-minute mark the Ghost Pirates garnered the game’s first goal on Hunter Johannes’s first tally of the season to give his team a 1-0 lead.
Less than a minute later, the Icemen evened the score on a wrist shot from Matteo Costantini. However, the Icemen lead would be short-lived as Savannah countered nearly 45 seconds later when Reece Vitelli found Dennis Cessana wide open in the slot. Cessana grabbed the puck and flexed a shot past Icemen goaltender Scott Ratzlaff for the go-head goal.
Savannah built a 3-1 lead halfway through the opening frame, but the Icemen rallied before the close of the period on late goals from Garrett Van Wyhe and Craig Martin, who made his return since the third game of the season. The goals evened the game at three after one period
The Ghost Pirates used the second period to build up a 5-3 lead, but for the second consecutive period, the Icemen scored a goal in the final minute Bennett MacArthur put back the rebound from a Christopher Brown shot into the net past Savannah goaltender Evan Cormier.
The goal was the first of three unanswered tallied for the Icemen, as MacArthur perfectly set up Van Wyhe on a 2-on-1 rush to put the Icemen within one once again.
Exactly five minutes later, Brody Crane made a strong to the net and flipped a shot off the goaltender but the rebound fell to Martin who buried at the crease to hive the Icemen a 6-5 edge and eventual win by that count.
Michael Bullion would go on to earn his third win of the season (3-0-0) while in a relief effort on Thursday. Seven Icemen players finished with two-point performances. The two teams play again on Friday in Jacksonville at 7:00 p.m.
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