By Shane Stockwell
Contributing Writer
The Lake Orion Dragons opened up the New Year with back-to-back games Friday and Saturday against Romeo and Notre Dame.
On Jan. 6, the Dragons were on the road against the Romeo Bulldogs, a team that has been great the past couple of years.
The first period of play was rather quiet until Conner Graham opened the scoring on a quick-wrister that beat the Romeo netminder high to give LO a 1-0 lead at the end of the first.
The Dragons came out hot to start the second period, controlling a majority of the play for the first five minutes.
Right around the 12-minute mark of the period, Graham fired a shot from the right hash mark that flew past the goalie’s glove hand to give Lake Orion a two-goal lead.
The rest of the period was all Romeo as the Bulldogs netted three goals in a short period of time that resulted in Lake Orion calling a timeout to slow down Romeo’s momentum.
Unfortunately for the Dragons, it was to no avail. Romeo added to their lead in the third period with a couple of power play goals and an empty netter to win 6-3.
The Dragons scored their lone goal on the power play off of a rebound knocked in by captain Joe Briskey.
The Dragons looked to bounce back Saturday night in front of their home student section against Notre Dame.
The game started similar to the Romeo game, with a slow first period.
It also ended the same way, with Conner Graham knocking home a loose puck in front of Notre Dame’s net to give LO a 1-0 lead heading into the locker room.
The Dragons defense looked steady as they held Notre Dame to just a few shots throughout the entire contest.
In the second period, T.J. Hirschfield added to the Dragons lead with a coast-to-coast goal, where he split two Notre Dame defenders and ripped a wrist shot high over the glove to put LO up two goals.
The Dragons would head into the third period leading 2-0 and needing to score the next goal to put Notre Dame away.
Lake Orion did just that when Josh Frketich caught a pass from Gabe Potyk in the slot and beat the goalie with a quick shot.
Frketich added another goal minutes later when a knuckle puck from the point managed to squeak by Notre Dame’s goalie.
Gabe Potyk scored the fifth goal of the night with less than two minutes left in the game as the Dragons went on to win comfortably, 5-0.
Lake Orion’s netminder Jacob Frketich, brother of Josh, picked up his first win of the season and stopped all of the shots he faced to pick up the shutout.
The Dragons improved to 8-4 on the season and face league opponent Troy on Thursday and play Grand Rapids Catholic Central on Saturday.