Calgary played their first of two scheduled doubleheaders this season with games against the Saskatchewan Rush and Las Vegas Desert Dogs. The Roughie’s dropped Friday’s game 16-13 to a very good Rush team, but bounced back in a huge way with a 21-8 trouncing of the Desert Dogs. The split keeps them in third position in a tight midfield battle for playoff positioning.
Friday’s game against the Rush was a tightly contested affair right up to the ten-minute mark of the fourth quarter. Tied at 11-11, the Rush did as their name suggests and blitzed the Roughnecks for five scores. Veteran Robert Church was instrumental in those closing moments tallying two goals and two assists and finishing the night with a team leading seven points. Additionally, in 39 career games against Calgary, Church has posted an impressive 163 points.
Next up for Calgary was a visit from the Las Vegas Desert Dogs. This was also the second game of the weekend for Vegas as they were coming off a 12-8 loss to the Vancouver Warriors.
While looking into how teams perform in the second game of a doubleheader, the odds suggested games are traditionally lower scoring and favor the fresher team. However, in a recent interview given by Team Canada’s hockey coach Jon Cooper, he stated that odds and betting lines mean very little to the teams involved. Team’s don’t care what the odds makers say or what is likely to happen, they play to win. That seemed very apparent on Sunday night.
The Roughnecks exploded out of the starting blocks and posted a 6-2 lead after the first quarter. Justin Inacio scored his first NLL goal and controlled the faceoff dot, (more on him later). When the dust settled, the Roughnecks had outscored Vegas 21-8 and thirty-eight-year-old Dane Dobbie and thirty-six-year-old Curtis Dickson had combined for 16 points.
As previously mentioned, Calgary’s faceoff man Justin Inacio is having a breakout season. He’s currently sitting in second place with a 62% win percentage – 4% behind Joe Nardella and 4% ahead of Jake Withers. The twenty-six-year-old from Oakville, Ontario is in his 3rd season with the Roughnecks although an injury kept him out of the lineup in his first year.
“I’m coaching faceoff sessions actually four times a week down in Columbus. I’ve got that stick in my hands all the time. I’m putting in a ton of work – it’s paying off. Last season didn’t sit right with me getting injured and not doing well at the faceoff X, so came in motivated this season,” said Inacio after the game. Not only did J.I. make a difference at the dot and on the scoresheet, he also got in an altercation with Las Vegas’s Tommy Burke in which he landed a decisive upper cut for the T.K.O.
Coach Sanderson praised his faceoff man to Roughneck TV. “For him to score his first goal and then obviously took a dirty hit and he stood up for himself. He had a hell of a game.”
Every team will be in action as the NLL has seven games on the slate for Week 13. Las Vegas (2-8) stays on the road with a stop in Colorado (6-4). Saskatchewan (8-2) flies out west to take on Vancouver (5-5), and the Calgary Roughnecks (6-4) will host the Rochester Knighthawks (4-7).
