Lobsters Hold off Ice Cats on NASCAR Night

NASCAR Night Draws Record Attendance, Lobsters Hold On

ATHENS, GA. - The Athens Rock Lobsters held on against the Pee Dee IceCats 6-5 in front of a record crowd of 5,913 on the first-ever NASCAR Night at Akins Ford Arena.

After Trevor Lord took the game’s first lead for the IceCats at the 3:45 mark of the first period, Brandon Picard scored his first home goal of the campaign to equalize on a great feed from Devyn Mayea.

The night after the team went 0-for-8 on the power play against Pee Dee, Jesse Lowell scored the first of four man-advantage notches on a backdoor put-in from an Eric Neiley pass.

Dominic Dumas scored a pair of power play goals himself in the second period to stay red hot over the past two weeks. Before last weekend, the Boise, Idaho native had six goals in 84 career games. He now has seven in his last four.

1:09 into the final frame, Alexander Legkov scratched one back to make it 4-2 on a burst and finish at William Lavalliere’s net.

A bit of a déjà vu moment minutes later, as Lowell scored a picture-perfect recreation of his first goal to restore the three-goal advantage. 

The IceCats continued on their prolific run on the shorthand, with a man-down goal from Patriks Marcinkevics before Daniil Glukharyov lasered one in to put the deficit at three again.

With significant power play time late on in the game, the Ice Cats rolled the dice and scored a pair of goals after emptying the net. Marcinkevics logged his second of the game with 4:37 left but the high-sticking major against Neiley came too late in the game for the visitors. Houston Wilson would scored with 12 seconds left, but the IceCats could not complete the comeback.

The Rock Lobsters (19-4-5-0, 67 pts) return to Akins Ford Arena tomorrow afternoon at 4:05 p.m. against the Columbus River Dragons. Tickets can be found here.