MONROE, LA - The Monroe Moccasins closed out their final home weekend before a lengthy road trip with a 4–3 loss to the Twin City Thunderbirds on Saturday night at the Monroe Civic Center.
The defeat dropped Monroe to 26-6-4-2-0 on the season, while Twin City improved to 13-20-1-3-0 as the two clubs split their only regular-season meetings of the year. The Thunderbirds wrapped up a seven-game road trip with a 4–3 record after the win.
Monroe opened the scoring midway through the first period when Tucker Scantlebury found the back of the net at 7:35 off assists from Austin Albrecht and Carlos Fornaris. Twin City answered quickly with a power-play goal from Roman Kraemer at 9:18 before Jacob Schnapp gave the Thunderbirds their first lead, 2-1 at 11:38.
The Moccasins pulled even late in the opening frame as Yianni Liarakos snuck one past Chad Purdy on the power play at 19:45, sending the teams into the intermission tied 2–2.
Twin City regained the advantage early in the second period on a goal from Cade Hanley, the first of his career at 2:58, but Monroe responded while shorthanded. Scantlebury scored his second of the night at 10:35 blasting one from the top of the faceoff circle to tie the game at 3–3 heading into the third period.
Despite controlling play in the final frame, Monroe was unable to break through against Thunderbirds goaltender Purdy, who was making just his second career start. Purdy turned aside all 19 shots he faced in the third period, which has been Monroe’s strongest period all season.
The Moccasins have outscored opponents 70–30 in the third period, but Dionne Demke scored the game winning goal at 11:24 of the third period to give the Thunderbirds the lead. Monroe finished with a 44–34 advantage in shots but could not solve Purdy at the end.
Monroe will now turn its attention to the Baton Rouge Zydeco on Sunday as the club begins a long road that will keep the Moccasins away from the Civic Center until early April.
FPHL 
