Calumet celebrates a goal in overtime against Houghton during the championship game of the 46th annual John MacInnes Holiday Hockey Classic on Tuesday, Dec. 28, 2021, in Houghton, Mich. (Adam Niemi/The Daily Mining Gazette)

HOUGHTON — Calumet Copper Kings hockey team found a way to knock a second rebound past Houghton Gremlins goaltender Bryant Lee nearly five minutes into overtime and win the 46th Annual John MacInnes Holiday Hockey Classic 3-2 Tuesday at the MacInnes Student Ice Arena.

For Calumet head coach Dan Giachino, it was just his second MacInnes Classic title, and also the second in a row for him and the Copper Kings, who won the 2019 title, the last time the tournament was played.

The Copper Kings (7-3) killed off a roughing penalty assessed to assistant captain Tom Erkkila in the overtime, giving themselves a little momentum to work with. Just 24 seconds after Erkkila returned to the ice, senior winger Paul Sturos exploded up the ice with speed on an odd-man rush. He drove around a Gremlins defender and fired a shot from the right circle that Lee stopped. The rebound kicked right back to Sturos, who fired another quick shot that Lee fought off from a bad angle, but he kicked the puck out into the slot. Sophomore Cam Anderson jumped on that rebound and pushed the puck through Lee and in to give the Copper Kings the win.

Sturos, who had two goals against the Hancock Bulldogs in the semifinal game on Monday, added a goal and an assist Tuesday to help the Copper Kings to the title.

“He’s playing really well,” said Giachino. “He’s playing well on both ends of the ice. That’s incredibly important for us right now, too. He’s playing every bit as well in the defensive zone as he is offensively, so, yeah, he’s stepped up.”

Just 10 days ago, the Copper Kings looked like they were going to be in for a very long season. They dropped three of four games, including a 6-1 loss to Bloomfield Hills-Cranbrook-Kingswood and found themselves at 3-3 with a schedule that included Detroit Country Day before facing Houghton, Hancock, and Houghton again. However, with the win Tuesday, Calumet has now won four in a row.

“Three weeks ago, I think we were kind of figuring out where we needed to go with this,” he said. “Kids were making a lot of mental mistakes and just some simple mistakes. We’ve cleaned some things up, and we’ve grown as a hockey team over the last three weeks really well.”

Sturos got the Copper Kings on the scoreboard quickly on his team’s first shot of the game. After the Gremlins (7-4 overall) had dominated much of the first two minutes of play, they missed an assignment defensively on the third shift of the contest, which allowed Sturos to find space to get open. Erkkila fed the puck to him on the back door, and Sturos beat Lee at 2:11.

Looking to even things, the Gremlins did just that at 12:52. When his penalty ended, co-captain Camden Markham hopped onto the ice just in time to join a rush up the ice. Catching up to junior Landon Stevens, the two skated in on a 2-on-1. Stevens opened up on his off-wing and fed the puck across the slot to Markham, who redirected the puck past Calumet goaltender Aksel Loukus.

The Copper Kings controlled much of the play in the early stages of the second period before the Gremlins got their footing back. The period’s final six minutes seemed to be tilted towards Loukus’ net. He stopped senior Brendan Miller’s third breakaway of the game. He then stopped a stuff attempt by sophomore Michael Maillette. He was finally beaten by a shot from Miller with 1:29 left in the frame, but the shot sailed wide of the post to Loukus’ left.

Gremlins coach Corey Markham was pleased with the effort his team put in despite the loss.

“I was really happy with how we played,” he said. “I thought we had a ton of chances, especially the second period. We had pucks go through the legs, and just missed the net. We hit the post. 

“We did a lot of good things. We played a lot better than we did last time we played Calumet and made some steps. I thought we were solid tonight. We didn’t get any bounces, get any puck luck.”

The Copper Kings broke the 1-1 tie 8:10 into the third period when junior Gabe Mattila scored his first goal of the season with a wrist shot that sailed up over Lee’s left shoulder and snuck under the crossbar.

Giachino was excited for Mattila, whom he felt was due for a goal.

“Actually, it’s kind of funny,” Giachino said. “I think it was sometime early in the game, I told him he had a fairly good scoring chance. I said, ‘Gabe, you’re due for one. You’ve been, the last three, four games, you’ve been generating some chances.’ You knew it was coming, just a little bit of confidence. I think, hopefully, that getting this first goal and getting that monkey off his back a little bit is gonna propel him in the second half of the year.”

The Gremlins evened the game again just 1:59 later when senior Aaron Kogan fired a long wrist shot from the left point that found its way through traffic and past Loukus.

Corey Markham felt that Kogan’s tally was not just important for the defenseman, but also for the team as a whole, as they proved they could fight back from adversity.

“I thought we had plenty of chances,” he said. “I thought we were wearing them down as the game went on. We had some unbelievable looks late in the game.”

Lee made 38 saves in the loss for the Gremlins in just his fourth game of the season. Corey Markham is excited to see what his young netminder will do in the second half of the season, now that he is healthy.

“He was so good,” Markham said. “We were so happy. That was the for us the shining star this game. 

“We know the potential Bryant has, and he keeps getting better and better. He’d been out for a long stretch with a concussion and is just getting back into game shape. He played tremendously tonight.”

Loukus made 28 saves to earn the win for the Copper Kings.

CHS 1 0 1 1 — 3

HHS 1 0 1 0 — 2

First Period–1, CHS, P. Sturos (Rilei, Erkkila), 2:11; 2, HHS, Markham (Stevens, Kogan), 12:52.

Third Period–3, CHS, Mattila (Erkkila), 8:10; 4, HHS, Kogan, 11:09.

Overtime–5, CHS, Anderson (Sturos), 4:42.

Saves–CHS, Loukus, 6-10-10-2–28. HHS, Lee, 10-12-10-6–38.

Power-play Opportunities–CHS 0 of 3. HHS 0 of 2.

Penalties-minutes–CHS 3-6. HHS 4-8.

Bulldogs fall in consolation game

The Bulldogs got another goal from co-captain Todd Anderson, but it was not enough as they came up short in the consolation game of the MacInnes Classic, 2-1, to the North Fond du Lac Cardinals.

Anderson’s goal came just 1:45 into the third period, evening the score at 1-1. The game remained even until Hancock junior Brady Galetto was whistled for slashing at 5:36.

The Cardinals’ Hunter Paar, who already had one goal in the contest at 14:46 of the first period, found himself with a chance to put his team up a second time and he buried a shot at 6:52 on the power play.

Sophomore Dan Wroblewski made 15 saves in the loss.

FDL 1 0 1 — 2

HCHS 0 0 1 — 1

First Period–1, FDL, Paar (Klapperich, Sabel), 14:46.

Third Period–2, HCH, Anderson (Nordstrom), 1:45; 3, FDL, Paar (Sabel, Koenigs), PP, 6:52.

Saves–FDL, Shober 4-6-5–15. HCHS, Wroblewski 4-7-4–15.

Power-play Opportunities–FDL 1 of 2. HCH 0 of 1.

Penalties-minutes–FDL 1-2; HCH 2-4.