TOLEDO, Ohio — The Metro Jets are again off to the USPHL National Tournament.
Down 1-0 to the Toledo Cherokee in a best-of-3 Great Lakes Division playoff series from the Team Toledo Ice House, the Jets won the next two in overtime to win the division championship and earn an automatic berth to the national tournament March 25-29 at the Ice Vault in Wayne, N.J.
Ayden Hartzell scored the overtime winner 2:58 into extra time Sunday afternoon after Jets captain Jake Taylor and Isaac Bunk scored 27 seconds apart at 3:20 and 3:47 of the third period to erase a 2-0 Toledo lead.
Jets goalie Philip Hall finished with 32 saves, only allowing first-period goals to Brendon Hammer and Landon Wharton in the 3-2 win.
Toledo goalie Logan McGuire finished with 24 saves.
“Are you not entertained?” asked Jets associate head coach Jamie Lovell. “When our two teams get together for a series, you know you’re going to see a great entertaining display of hockey. We believe Toledo is one of the best teams in our entire league every year, so we appreciate this victory even more. This year was no different. Toledo is an incredible team, but we believe in our model and our players. We have stuck with this group of players from Day 1 basically, making them better, developing them for these moments.
“We’re so proud of this group for the way they fought back in the series and in each of these last two elimination games. We’re not done yet, though. We’re battle tested now and need to take this experience with us into nationals.”
In the opener Friday night, Toledo won 6-2 as Charlie Nolette scored two goals and goalie Daxton Lucidi made 31 saves. Jacob Myers, Jay Cormier, Cameron Krause and Jimmy Monks added goals and Robert Leis put up two assists.
Sutton Majeske and Luka Pivec tallied the Jets goals and Hall posted 26 saves.
Saturday night, Jayden Provencher scored the winner 10:15 into overtime and also assisted on AJ Zaccagni’s goal in a 2-1 victory.
Hall stopped 44 shots
Leis scored the lone Toledo goal and McGuire finished with 35 saves.
Stay tuned for more information on USPHL Nationals as it becomes available.
All USPHL games are available at BlackBearSports.tv.
