Timmins Rock forward Brant Romaniuk, shown in this file photo celebrating a goal at the McIntyre Arena, scored a natural hat-trick against the Storm in Iroquois Falls Sunday afternoon. The second of those three-consecutive goals, a shorthanded effort, proved to be the game-winning tally, as the Rock went on to defeat the Storm 6-2. Photo by FILE /The Daily Press
Sunday afternoon’s victory pushed the Timmins Rock’s current winning streak to five games and helped them improve to 11-5-0-1 on the season
Thomas Perry
The Daily Press/Postmedia Network
IROQUOIS FALLS — Brant Romaniuk’s natural hat-trick helped lift the Timmins Rock to a 6-2 win over the Storm at the Jus Jordan Arena, Sunday afternoon.
It was the lone game of the weekend for the Rock who saw their scheduled game against the Lumberjacks in Hearst Friday night postponed because of inclement weather.
Still, Sunday afternoon’s victory pushed the Rock’s current winning streak to five games and helped them improve to 11-5-0-1 on the season, good for sole possession of sixth place in the NOJHL standings.
Meanwhile the Storm saw their record fall to 8-9-0-2 on the campaign and the gap between their seventh place position in the standings and the Rock increase to five points and Timmins still has two games in hand.
Things were close early on Sunday afternoon, as the teams were tied at 1-1 following the opening 20 minutes of action, even though the Rock outshot the Storm 20-7 in the frame.
Diego Da Silva’s 10th goal of the season staked the Rock to a 1-0 advantage seven minutes into the period.
But Landon Trethewey’s third goal of the campaign with just 12 seconds remaining in the frame tied things up heading into the first intermission.
Romaniuk put the Rock back in front, this time to stay, just 51 seconds into the second period as he scored the first of his three-consecutive goals and 15th of the season.
“I am not sure, I had a hat-trick my 16-year-old season, but I am not sure if it was natural or not,” he said, when asked if he has ever scored three-consecutive goals before.
A quick check of the records show that hat-trick, recorded March 2, 2024, versus the Gold Miners in Kirkland Lake was not was not natural.
Earlier this season, Romaniuk scored an even-strength goal, a shorthanded tally and a power-play marker but those goals were not scored one after the other, either.
A shorthanded tally eight-and-a-half minute later, Romaniuk’s 16th of the season, added to the Rock advantage.
“I was in the penalty box and then I came out and I had a lot of energy,” he said. “I was forechecking hard and I caused a turnover and picked the puck up on the half wall, then I went up ice, cut back, made a move on a guy and made a move to the middle and shot the puck through the D’s legs and it went in low blocker, I think it was.”
The Timmins product was clearly looking to make something positive happen after spending two minutes in the sin bin.
“I am offensive minded, so I am always trying to set something up, get a little offence going, even on the PK (penalty kill), so it worked out,” Romaniuk said.
He then completed his natural hat-trick with another even-strength marker, his 17th goal of the season, five-and-a-half minutes later.
The Storm managed to get one of those goals back before the second intermission, as Alexandre St. Pierre netted his fifth marker of the campaign.
That would be as close as the Storm would come to getting back on even terms, however, as the Rock added a pair of third-period markers to make the final 6-2 in their favour.
Thomas Beard accounted for the first of those tallies when he scored his eighth goal of the season, just over eight minutes into the frame.
Matteo Paradiso then added a power-play marker, his second goal in his third game since being acquired by the Rock, to close out the scoring.
A second-period fight saw Rock blue-liner Matthew Kim and Storm forward Benjamin Coupal ejected from the contest after they were both assessed five-minute majors for fighting and game misconducts. In addition, Coupal was assessed a gross misconduct for illegal equipment (removing his opponent’s helmet).
Romaniuk spent most of Sunday afternoon’s contest playing on a line with Lucas Lowe and Kaeden McArthur, a pair of players who complement his skill set quite nicely.
“We had a slow start in the first period and we knew we had to figure things out, so we started working hard together,” he said. “We moved the puck really well and I buried my chances, so kudos to them for helping me with that.”
With five-straight wins under their belt, Romaniuk noted the Rock are starting to feel much more confident than they had earlier in the season.
“We have a really good vibe going,” he said. “We are a family and we are all just working hard, trying to stay positive, even when things aren’t going our way and I think it is working really well for us during this streak.”
Facing a goaltender he has known for some time in Alex Hall, who played previously with the GNU18L’s Timmins Majors, Romaniuk wasn’t too sure which of them had an advantage due to that familiarity.
“Growing up, I used to play against him all the time and we have played together on teams, for sure, in the past,” he said. “He came out for some practices and stuff when he was APed (affiliate player) with the Timmins Rock, so I know a bit about him.
“I think that makes it a little harder to play against him, but at the same time I kind of have an idea of what he is going to do, so it kind of evens out.”
While the Rock didn’t play a perfect game Sunday afternoon, coach and general manager Brandon Perry found more positives than negatives when he sat back and assessed things.
“We had good moments, for sure,” he said. “We weren’t really sharp the first two periods. We had a couple of power plays in a row that kind of skewed the shots, but we were just turning too many pucks over and not backchecking as hard as we needed to, weren’t getting out of our zone clean enough, but we had a solid third period and got the job done.”
As one might expect, the Rock coach liked what he saw from Romaniuk — especially during the second period.
“We weren’t great during the first period and he kind of took the game over in the second period,” Perry said. “He gave us the spark we needed and we kind of rolled from there. He dominated. He was fantastic today.”
Romaniuk was, of course, not the only Rock player to make a positive impression on their coach Sunday afternoon.
“I thought Diego Da Silva was great today,” Perry said. “I thought he played a solid game. Thomas Beard, Ryan Armitage and Lucas Lowe were good. Maxfeld Shin was good.
“Everybody had their moments today, but those guys and Brant are the ones who stood out for me.”
Perry was, for the most part, pleased with the Rock’s efforts on special teams Sunday afternoon.
“We had three power plays in a row during the first period and we weren’t getting anything going, bad shot selection, I would say, and I.F. was doing a really good job on it (penalty kill) and getting in the shot lanes,” he said. “I thought our power play was really good in the third period and, obviously, our penalty kill did a good job all day, so special teams were okay.”
Rock goalie Ayden Mullen, who stopped 21 of the 23 shots he faced, picked up his fifth win of the season.
Hall, who turned aside 44 of the 50 shots the Rock directed his way, was tagged with the loss.
NOJHL NOTES — The three stars of the game were Romaniuk, Da Silva and Trethewey … The Rock went 1-5 on the power play and scored a shorthanded goal, while the Storm were 0-3 with the man advantage … Official attendance at the Jus Jordan Arena was 336 … Sunday’s only other action saw the Beavers double up the Kirkland Lake Gold Miners 4-2 in Blind River … The Rock will return to action when they host the Soo Thunderbirds at the McIntyre Arena, on Friday, at 7:30 p.m.
