Before the close of the opening 20 minutes, Trevor Connelly (Manhattan Beach, Calif.) made it four in a row as he was spurred ahead on a breakaway by a stretch pass from LJ Mooney (West Mifflin, Pa.). In alone, Connelly deked quickly and fired over the blocker of Martinsen for a 4-0 lead. Christian Humphreys (Pittsburgh, Pa.) poked the puck to Mooney to collect his second point of the tournament.
Team USA added another 2:09 into the second off a sharp-angled shot from Mooney. Logan Hensler (Woodbury, Minn.) sent a long outlet to the forward who collected at the blue line, drove the right lane and banked his shot from the bottom of the circle off the goalie and in.
With a little more than five minutes to play in the middle period, Humphreys was tripped unabated to the net and awarded a penalty shot. He skated in slowly and picked the top right corner for his second goal in as many games.
In the opening minute of the final period, Norway’s Mikkel Eriksen chipped one up and over U.S. goaltender Jack Parsons (Ithaca, N.Y.) to put the Norwegians on the board.
Team USA responded with 13:06 to play as Hensler snapped one in from the center point, assisted by Dakoda Rheaume-Mullen (Northville, Mich.) and Connelly.
Hagens grabbed his third point of the evening, with a quick release from the left hashes to complete Team USA’s scoring.
Mattias Dehli converted for Norway on a late power play for the game’s 8-2 final.
Parsons finished with 16 saves to pick up his first IIHF victory in net.
Team USA is back in action tomorrow (April 28) as they square off with Latvia in the third game of the preliminary round. Opening faceoff is set for 6:00 p.m. local / 11:00 a.m. ET and the game will air live on NHL Network.
