Hockey: Jackalopes beat Laredo in overtime, again

To no one’s surprise, the Odessa Jackalopes and Laredo Bucks played bonus hockey Friday night at Ector County Coliseum.

And, as they have all season, the Jackalopes finished on the right side of the scoreboard.

Philippe Plante’s power-play redirection of a pass from Sebastien Thinel inside the right post with 47 seconds gone in overtime lifted Odessa to a 4-3 victory over the Bucks in front of 3,620 in the penultimate game of the regular season.

It was the fifth time in seven meetings this season that the Jackalopes have defeated the Bucks in either overtime or a shootout.

“That was a pretty good play by Sebby,” Plante said. “I just put my stick down and he put the puck right on it.

“It’s always a tough game against Laredo. They are a good hockey club and this was a good win for us.”

Troy Ofukany, Collin Circelli and Alex Dunn also scored for the Jackalopes (47-11-5), who tied the franchise record for victories and will try to set a new mark at 7:05 p.m. tonight against Rapid City in the regular-season finale.

Thinel and Jeff Pierce each had two assists for Odessa, who will play the winner of the Corpus Christi-Texas first-round playoff series. The Jackalopes will open the Southern Conference semifinals on either March 26 or March 27, depending on the length of the IceRays-Brahmas series.

Jackalopes coach Paul Gillis was pleased with most of the effort Friday night, but was not happy with the Bucks scoring a pair of goals in 27 seconds in the third period to tie the game 3-3.

“I thought that we controlled the game,” Gillis said. “I thought their goalie was fantastic, we should have a had a few more.

“This is our best preparation for next week, just playing well and that’s what we are trying to do. Nonetheless, you can’t have that letdown for a couple shifts, you have to stay on it and keep pushing for 60 full minutes and we let up for two shifts and they tied the game.”

Ofukany started the scoring early in the first period after some nice work by Brian Swiniarski and Josh Chase to keep the puck alive in the Laredo zone. Swiniarski finally corralled the puck in the right corner, spun around and fed Ofukany between the circle and Ofukany snapped a wrist shot past Laredo goaltender Kevin Desfosses just 3:46 into the game.

That was the score with time winding down in the first period when Laredo’s Sylvain Deschatelets gathered in a loose puck in the right circle and snapped a sharp-angled shot that beat Jackalopes goaltender Juha Toivonen with one second before the first intermission.

Circelli then put Odessa back in front with a power-play goal at the 12:09 mark of the second period and Dunn extended the lead with his tally at 2:22 of the third period.

The Bucks’ Darryl Smith and Todd Griffith, however, brought Laredo right back with their goals at the 10:39 and 11:06 marks, respectively.

>> ICE CHIPS: Jackalopes goaltender Joel Martin was honored Friday as the 2009-2010 Central Hockey League’s Most Outstanding Goaltender. Martin has compiled a 26-6-2 record this season, with 2.51 goals against average and a .918 save percentage, all in the top five in the league. He also has a pair of shutouts and nine shootout victories. … Before the game, the Jackalopes had the Bud Poile Governors’ Cup on display in the West Entrance to Ector County Coliseum. It is the second time that the organization has captured the hardware indicative of the best regular-season record in the league, joining the 2001-2002 club.