Central Hockey League: Van Drunen plays the hero for Jacks

Same cast of characters.
Different night.
Different hero.
With Kenny Bernard driving the net from the right circle and Mike Ramsay carrying the puck through the right circle, Dave Van Drunen skated down the slot unmolested and when Ramsay slid the puck his way, the veteran defenseman didn’t miss.
Snapping a wrist shot past goaltender Doug Groenestege at the 1:26 mark of overtime, Van Drunen lifted the Odessa Jackalopes to a 2-1 victory over the Arizona Sundogs on Friday night in front of 3,856 at Ector County Coliseum.
“Lucky, lucky me,” Van Drunen said. “Kenny was driving the net hard and Rammer gave me a nice pass and I was able to put it upper corner.
“It was nice to come back and get the win because Arizona played a lot better than the last time we saw them.”
In their first game back home in nearly a month because of the SandHills Stock Show and Rodeo and a motocross event, the Jackalopes won their eighth consecutive game, with Ramsay scoring the other Odessa marker. The Jackalopes now are 7-0 against Arizona this season and the teams will meet at 7:05 tonight at the Coliseum.
Ramsay, Sebastien Thinel and Collin Circelli each finished with one assist for the Jackalopes (33-6-3).
Steve Potvin scored for the Sundogs (13-25-3).
The Sundogs started the game aggressively, outshooting the Jackalopes 20-4 in the first period, with much of the play ending up in the Odessa zone.
That pressure ended with the first goal of the game as Potvin was able to shove a rebound past Jackalopes goaltender Joel Martin at the right post with 5:41 left in the first period.
The play started from the left circle on Kevin Gardner’s shot, which Martin saved, along with the first rebound attempt by Chad Hinz.
The puck, however, slid too far away from Martin and Potvin capitalized on the opportunity.
“I thought we started off well, for the first five minutes of the first period,” Jackalopes coach Paul Gillis said. “But then they started coming, with four and five guys and we started taking penalties and they were able to get a goal.
“I thought we did a better job in the second period and were able to tie the game and then played well in the third period, then took advantage of our chance in overtime.”
In the second period, Ramsay scored a power-play goal with the Jackalopes enjoying a two-man advantage in the final minute of the period.
Setting up in the left circle, Ramsay took a cross-ice feed from Thinel and snapped a wrist shot that eluded Groenestege with 29.61 seconds left before the break.
“Found a hole,” said Ramsay, who had a hat trick against Rio Grande Valley on Wednesday. “Arizona was playing tough, so this was a good win for us, especially after being on the road for so long.”
>> ICE CHIPS: Former Jackalopes forward Donnie Margettie was honored before the game when the club unveiled his number in the Jackalopes Wall of Fame. Margettie played in 383 games in seven seasons in the Permian Basin, finishing with 257 points (97 goals, 160 assists) and 1,101 penalty minutes. Margettie, since his retirement in 2008, has joined the Odessa Fire Department as a paramedic and works with the Jackalopes junior hockey program.