BOYS HOCKEY: Trojans rout Sioux Center

WORTHINGTON — Levi Leach and Andrew Johnson accounted for seven of the Worthington Trojans 11 goals in a 11-0 shutout victory over the Sioux Center Storm Monday in a non-conference boys hockey game.

“Levi has got a ton of speed and it is really starting to stand out here in the last couple games,” WHS coach Nate Grimmius said. “This momentum boost really goes back to the Marshall game when we challenged the kids to play with emotion and intensity. I think we are finally starting to see that with this group.”

Leach got the scoring started for the Trojans half way through the first period on a slap-shot from the top of the circles that beat Storm goalie Cody Vogel. Johnson scored Worthington’s second goal of the night with just 1 minute, 24 seconds left in the period on a pass from Nick Newman to make it 2-0.

“It was nice to be able to cycle the puck and the offensive puck movement was nice to finally see,” Grimmius said. “Hopefully that continues for us.”

The Trojans made it 3-0 just 15 seconds later on a seeing-eye slap shot by Seth Meier from the point. Leach picked up his second goal with 26 seconds left in the period on a breakaway where he deked Vogel out of position and put the puck home to give Worthington a four points lead at intermission.

“For most of the year we have had a lot of defensive play and had the puck in our own zone,” Grimmius said. “So it was nice to see the puck on the other end of the ice for most of the game tonight. We were able to get some pressure down there rather than have pressure on us in our end.”

Johnson picked up his second goal of the game a minute into the second period off of a rebound that bounced off Vogel’s pads right onto his stick.

“I just saw a bunch of rebounds coming off the goalie, so I decided I should just stand next to him and the puck came to me a couple times,” Johnson said.

Jacob Oberloh notched his first goal of the game on a point-blank shot to give the Trojans a 6-0 lead with 12:53 left in the second.

Leach completed his hat trick on a snipe from the dots off of a turnover by the Storm just inside the blue-line at 11:58 in the second.

“It is nice to get a win and get that many points on the board,” Leach said. “After I got my three goals tonight, I tried to get as many people goals as I could.”

Newman rounded out the scoring for Worthington in the second on a shot that trickled past Vogel as he attempted to corral the puck. The Trojans led 8-0 after two.

“We had a lot of momentum coming from the last game,” Johnson said. “We tried to put up as many points as we could tonight. It was nice to be on the other side scoreboard than we have been in the rest of the games this year.”

Johnson completed his hat trick early in the third off of another rebound spit out by Vogel to increase Worthington’s lead to nine.

“We all have on and off nights,” Leach said. “Some people do better than others some games. I don’t think that anybody is better than anybody on this team.”

Oberloh picked up his second goal of the game on a two-on-one play where Leach saucer passed the puck to Oberloh for the goal. Leach jumped his goal total for the night to four on a rebound put back that rung off the pipe before ricocheting into the net with 42 seconds left in the game.

“These guys are playing with a little chip on their shoulders,” Grimmius said. “They are winning those races to the puck and skating hard all game. We want to try and keep that intensity when we play again this weekend.”

Rylan Scholtes stopped all three shots he faced in the first period, before being replaced by Alex Purdy for the final two periods. Purdy made five saves in the game. The Trojans outshot the Storm 44 to 8 on the night.

The Trojans (3-9) host Southwest Conference foe Morris/Benson Area Saturday in the second game of a boys/girls doubleheader at 3 p.m.

SC 0 0 0 — 0

WHS 4 4 3 — 11

Daily Globe Reporter Jordan Willi may be reached at 376-7335.

Tags: sports, prep, boys, hockey, trojans