TRURO: Nolan Boyd put in a star worthy performance between the pipes for the Grand Falls Rapids as they hit the ice at the Rath Eastlink Community Centre to battle with the Truro Bearcats.
Unfortunately for Boyd and the Rapids, they came away with a 3-2 shootout loss in the Maritime Junior A Hockey League (MHL) game on Jan. 18 despite Boyd, a Fall River product, stellar play. He stopped 31 of 33 shots sent his way during regulation and overtime by the third place Eastlink South conference Bearcats.
Several of the saves Boyd made were of the highlight variety which helped propel his young team, that sits last in the Eastlink North division and second last overall in the league, to the one point for the shootout loss.
In the game it saw Boyd face a few Fall River and Lockview High friends who don the colours of the Bearcats. Those being Kyle Sexton of Fall River and Ellershouse’s Damian Hartt, who attends Lockview High.
Hartt picked up an assist in the game, while Sexton saw limited ice but managed to setup a couple good opportunities for his teammates.
There was a crowd of about 35 people from Fall River on-hand at the RECC to cheer on Boyd in his first of two “home” games locally.
On Jan. 20, Boyd and his Rapids headed to Berwick to battle last place Valley Wildcats.
With a couple of trade deadline moves, the Wildcats are a much improved squad and that showed as they led 5-0 after the first. Andrew Rose was the starter for Grand Falls.
Boyd came on in relief to start the second and went the rest of the way turning in another strong performance, stopping 26 of 27 shots. Valley won the game 6-3.
Over the two games, Boyd had a 1.85 Goals Against Average against Truro and 1.37 GAA for the contest against Valley. He stopped 57 of 60 pucks.
For the season, the stellar weekend improved Boyd’s numbers to 2-6-0-2-1 (won-loss-tied-overtime loss-shootout loss), allowing 58 goals in 780 minutes played for a 4.46 GAA. He has a 86.9 save percentage on the first year Rapids.
