Central Hockey League: Jacks bounce back by beating Bucks

The Odessa Jackalopes took out their frustrations Sunday afternoon on the Laredo Bucks — and started a new Central Hockey League winning streak in the process.

Mike Ramsay, Sebastien Thinel, Jeff Pierce and Philippe Plante all scored goals for the Jackalopes as they defeated Laredo 4-3 in front of a crowd of 2,612 at Ector County Coliseum.

The Jackalopes (34-6-4, 72 points) are 18-2-2 since Dec. 5, but they had an eight-game winning streak snapped with a 6-5 shootout loss Saturday to Arizona.

“We’ve had a tough string of games and we’re losing our game a little,” Jackalopes coach Paul Gillis. “These last three games at home, we haven’t played as well as we would like and you go through stages where that happens.

“We need some practice. We have not had a real practice in at least a couple weeks, but we aren’t going to get them yet, so we are just going to have to hang in here and work hard.”

Thinel added two assists to the victory, with Alex Dunn, Dominic Leveille, Plante, James Sanford and Dave Van Drunen providing one each.

Jeff Bes scored a pair of goals for the Bucks (19-15-7), including an extra-attacker tally with nine seconds left in the game to pull Laredo within one goal. It was the second extra-attacker goal the Jackalopes have allowed in as many games, with the Arizona Sundogs using theirs to force overtime Saturday before winning in the shootout.

Mike Looby scored the other Laredo goal.

“We’ll take the win because they are very hard to come by in this league and Laredo is a very good team and they are making a playoff push,” Gillis said. “Every team we see now is going to be pushing for the playoffs and we are going to get their best every night, so we need to respond to that.”

Ramsay started the scoring just 5:30 into the contest on a nice end-to-end rush down the right wing.

Taking a pass from Van Drunen, Ramsay raced up the boards and into the Laredo zone, eluding the stick check of one Bucks’ defender and then skating around another Laredo player sliding on the ice attempting to disrupt the play.

That left Ramsay alone in the right circle and he quickly snapped a shot that rang off the inside of the left post past goaltender Pier-Olivier Pelletier for the 1-0 lead.

Looby tied it up with his power-play goal at 14:19 of the first period, snapping a shot through a screen in front of Odessa goaltender Joel Martin.

Thinel then defied the laws of geometry, sending a round object through a miniscule square as his shot from near the goal line on the right side found its way past Pelletier, who was hugging the right post, at the 2:06 mark of the second period.

“I don’t know how that got in there,” Jackalopes forward Jean Bourbeau said. “He’s scored a lot of them that way. Guess it proves that if you throw the puck on net, good things can happen.”

Bes scored his first of the night less than two minutes later when he deflected the puck inside the left post on a shot by Jarred Mohr at the top of the right circle.

Pierce then converted on the power play for Odessa, taking a pass from Dunn at the left point, skating across the top of the zone and then firing a shot from the right circle that beat Pelletier to the blocker side with 2:59 left before the second intermission.

Plante then gave the Jackalopes the needed insurance with his power-play goal early in the third period. Levielle and Thinel each had attempted to score but were rebuffed by Pelletier, but the puck bounced into the air at the left post and Plante hammered in home just 3:19 in to the period.