Dekumbis Notches OT Winner, Prowlers Earn Sweep

It took overtime but the Port Huron Prowlers took down the Mississippi Sea Wolves 5-4 on McMorran Place on Oct. 28. Vincent Dekumbis was the OT hero with his first goal of the season.

“[Dekumbis] put in a lot of work over the summer, as you can tell,” said Prowlers head coach Matt Graham. “He was our best player throughout camp. He’s a full 200-foot player which is what I love about him. He’s a catalyst for us.”

The Prowlers opened the scoring in the first when Brandon Picard beat Joseph Sheppard to the glove side with a wrist shot on the rush. Braden Deck doubled the advantage when he sent a shot from the point that found the twine right off the faceoff for his first professional goal.

Sam Marit made it 3-0, banging home a loose puck in front of the net on the power play. Just like the night before, Mississippi battled back. Kyle Russell got the Sea Wolves on the board and then Jackson Bond scored shorthanded less than two minutes later. Joakim Nilsson tied the game with under two minutes to go in the period.

“As the game goes on, guys start searching for a little more offense,” Graham said. “You get a lead, they start to smell blood and they want to score more so we start to lose sight of those defensive habits.”

Chuck Costello gave Mississippi its first lead of the game early in the third and the Prowlers were in danger of falling to their Biloxi rivals for the first time. With seven minutes left in the third, it all broke loose. Deck and Hugo Koch got tangled up on the boards, leading to whistles and penalties, and then Joe Pace came flying in to grab and punch Dekumbis. Koch and Deck got matching minor penalties with Koch also picking up an extra two. Pace got five for fighting, two for instigating and was kicked out of the game. That led to Port Huron being on the man-advantage for nearly the entire rest of regulation.

The Prowlers were still down 4-3 in the final minute when Connor Lind took an unsportsmanlike penalty and, with the goalie pulled, Port Huron was on a six-on-three advantage. Graham found Tristan Simm back door with 14 seconds to go to tie the game at four.

In overtime, the Prowlers were still up a man, four-on-three, when the puck sat in the blue paint before it was banged home by Dekumbis. He was named the first star of the game.

“I saw the puck was loose and the goalie wasn’t covering it,” Dekumbis said. “I just hammered it and it went in.”

The Prowlers pulled out the victory behind three assists from Graham, the game’s third star. Austin Fetterly had two helpers. Makar Sokolov picked up the victory in his first career start after making 33 saves.

Yianni Liarakos and Philip Wong had two assists apiece for the Sea Wolves. Liam Murray officially gets the loss after he came in for Sheppard late in the first and again in the second period. He gave up three goals on 33 shots.

The Prowlers get a week off before a home-and-home with the Motor City Rockers on Nov. 10 and 11.

Photo courtesy of Delta Imaging