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Steamboat hockey falls against Summit

Luke Graham
Steamboat Springs hockey players, from left, Tyler Scott, Matt Hale and Ben Wharton look to score against Summit goalie Tyrus Vanmatre in first-period hockey action in Breckenridge on Saturday evening. Summit won, 6-3.
Courtesy Photo

The first 27 seconds of Saturday’s Steamboat Springs vs. Summit County hockey game were very indicative of the day. 

The Tigers’ Travis Potts intercepted a pass inside the Sailors zone and beat goaltender Thomas Tarcha for a 1-0 lead. 

From there, it was mostly all Summit thanks in large part to an undisciplined Steamboat team. The Tigers were able to skate away with a 6-3 victory. 



“Hopefully, we’ll get the ship right,” Steamboat coach Jeff Ruff said. “We got to put up points in our conference. It’s go time. We can’t keep shooting ourself in the foot.”

After Potts’ goal, Curtis Dankof gave the Tigers a 2-0 lead before Steamboat responded with three unanswered goals. 



Lance Ostrom and Alex Elliott bookended a Ben Wharton power play goal to make it 3-2 Steamboat. 

But Summit came back at the end of the period and scored a power play goal to knot it at 3 all. 

From there, it was all Summit. 

Evan Streit scored back-to-back power-play goals at the end of the second and beginning of the third periods to make it 5-3. 

Peter Grotemeyer added a late goal for the final result. 

Steamboat was called for 12 penalties, including a game misconduct and a charging major. 

“We ran into penalty problems, and they took advantage of them,” Ruff said. “When you’re in the penalty box, you can’t roll all your lines. When we’re constantly killing penalties, you can’t get any sort of momentum.”

Steamboat (4-5) previously had beaten Summit, 3-2, earlier in the season. 

But Ruff said that the Tigers were more hungry and that Steamboat never could string anything together. 

On top of the penalties, Ruff said the Sailors struggled to possess and protect the puck, with too many turnovers leading to easy chances. 

“They had a real long talk about penalties,” Ruff said. “We just can’t sit in that penalty box. We can’t control the referees. But we can control to how we react to the plays.”

Steamboat next plays at 6:30 p.m. Friday at home against Aspen.

To reach Luke Graham, call 970-871-4229 or email lgraham@SteamboatToday.com


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