Bobcats Beat Buzzer, Earn 6-5 Walkoff Win Over Wolves

WYTHEVILLE, VA-

On the night that their captain scored his 100th career FPHL goal, the Blue Ridge Bobcats didn't end the thrills there,  scoring 4 goals in a wild third period and notching the game winner with 8.1 seconds left in regulation to walkoff with a thrilling 6-5 win over the Watertown Wolves before a crowd of better than 1,500 at Hitachi Energy Arena.

Both teams took the first five minutes and change of the opening frame to feel each other out, as the two franchises met for the first time since April of 2024. Yefim Mishkin opened the scoring for Watertown with a wrist shot that beat Hunter Virostek low-blocker side from the high slot just over 5 minutes into the 1st period. Quinn Chevers followed just past halfway in the opening frame with the first of three Wolves' power play goals on the evening.

Filip Hlavac gave Blue Ridge some much needed momentum going into the first intermission with a power play goal of his own at the 19:42 mark of the opening 20 minutes to make it a 2-1 game.

Watertown notched two of the three goals in the second period, both being power play markers from defenseman Dominic Della-Civita. The first a wrist shot from the point through traffic, the second a one-time blast that beat Virostek top corner glove side. That pair of man advantage goals were sandwiched by a milestone marker. Captain Danny Martin scored his 100th career FPHL goal at the 15:27 mark of the second, redirecting a wrist shot from Hlavac past Brendan Colgan and sending the Friday night crowd into a frenzy. But, the Wolves took a 4-2 lead into the second intermission.

Anthony Shrum took over in relief of Virostek in net in the third, and made key desperation saves to keep Blue Ridge going. The Bobcats found their forecheck early and often in the third, starting the scoring of a combined 5-goal final frame just 49 seconds into it with a top shelf wrist shot by Nick Stuckless to cut it to a 4-3 Watertown advantage. Just over 5 minutes later, Carson Andreoli roofed a wrister home out of a wacky net mouth scramble to tie the game at 4. 7:24 later, Nikita Kozyrev finally got the monkey off his back with his first goal as a Bobcat, jetting between two Watertown defenders and stuffing a backhander short side to put Blue Ridge ahead 5-4.

Brad Reitter briefly tied the game at 5 with just over 30 seconds left in regulation, roofing a rebound past Shrum with the Wolves pulling Colgan for the extra attacker. Then, with 8.1 left in regulation, PJ Demitrio stunned the crowd and shocked his former team, backhanding a shot off Colgan's shoulder and between his pads for the latest game-winning regulation goal in franchise history.

Kozyrev's goal and assist earned him third star, and Brandon Reller netted second star honors with a season-high 4 assists on the evening. Martin's century-mark goal garnered him first star.

This was the first of a three game weekend series, which continues tomorrow night on Teddy Bear Toss night. Puck drop is set for 7:30 PM.