LYNN — In a day where pucks seemed to be going every which way, it took a picture-perfect thing of precision for the Lynn Jets to come away with a 4-3 win Saturday’s over Somerville in their season’s opener.
“We didn’t play our best,” said coach Mike Roberts, whose team gave him his first career win. “We played better in some of our scrimmages.”
The Jets made things harder on themselves — and new goalie Jack Gallant (a converted defenseman playing his first-ever game at any level in the net) — by committing four penalties, and having Somerville score on three of them.
“We’ve been stressing that we have to stay out of the box,” Robert said. “We took a couple of bad ones.”
All of Lynn’s goals came at even strength.
It was a seesaw game from the get-go. Lynn never trailed, but each time the Jets scored, it seemed as if they’d almost immediately commit a penalty. And every time, Somerville responded with a power-play goal.
Sean Devin got the season started off the right way for the Jets at 8:04 of the first period, taking a feed from Travis Ryan at dead center from about 10 feet out and beating Somerville’s Ryan Vogul to give his team a 1-0 lead.
After Lynn was whistled for a penalty — the referee ruling that a player had shot the puck just after he’d blown the whistle — Somerville tied the game when Derek Doane scored with an assist from Austin Pacheco and Joe Carey.
The second period wasn’t even two minutes old when John Difilippo scored, with an assist from Brian Clougherty. The goal came after some sustained action in front of the Somerville net, with Difilippo banging home the puck.
Once again, though, Lynn ended up in the box, and once again, Somerville made the Jets pay. This time, several Highlanders had some healthy whacks at the puck before Chris DiSousa was able to convert, with Pacheco and Will Pores getting the helpers. The goal came almost exactly at the midway point in the period, and tied the score at 2-2.
With 3:49 left in the middle period, John McDonald gave Lynn a 3-2 lead, lifting a shot from in close, to Vogel’s right, with an assist from Aidan Seitz.
Lynn couldn’t avoid another penalty, though, this one with about a minute to go in the period, giving the Highlanders a power play that extended into the final period.
They didn’t waste any time taking advantage of it. With only 11 seconds gone in the third period, Somerville’s CJ Restini tied the score for the third time in the game.
Lynn, which had the territorial advantage throughout the game, looked as if it was nonetheless headed for a tie when the Clougherty brothers struck.
Junior Brian Clougherty took the puck into the faceoff circle to Vogul’s left, and then laid a perfect pass onto the stick of his brother, senior Mike Clougherty. In one fluid motion, Mike Clougherty fired the puck past Vogul.
Lynn had to sweat out a last-minute push by Somerville with the goalie pulled, but it did — and came away with the hard-fought win.
“I’m glad we were able to get the win,” said Roberts. “That was a great play, on our last goal.
“There were a lot of bounding pucks,” he said. “I think a lot of that was just jitters. I also thought Jack (Gallant) played very well. That last goal he gave up was a tip-in. Not much he could do about that.”
