Roanoke Handles Knoxville 3-0 In Final Regular Season Home Game (4-5-24)

By: Joey Raymond

All Photo Credit: Katie Lovell-LMS Network 

Roanoke, VA –For the final time in the regular season, the Roanoke Rail Yard Dawgs welcomed their fans back inside the Dawg house. Coming into this game, Roanoke sits firmly in third place in the SPHL standings. This guarantees that the Dawgs will host in the first round of the playoffs, something the Dawgs are looking forward to. Before they can get to those games though, they need to take care of business against their arch-rival, the Knoxville Ice Bears. Roanoke comes into this game after a weekend sweep of the Fayetteville Marksmen, while notching some franchise records while doing so. Those records are the highest finish in the season standings and the first 70-point season in franchise history. Knoxville is not eligible for the playoffs this season after finishing at the bottom of the league standings. 

After the anthem is played, the Dawgs would have a recognition ceremony for Josh Nenadal who was named team MVP of the year. Rightfully so, putting together one of the most impressive seasons in Dawgs history. Once all the ceremonies were complete it was time for the Dawgs to get to work, and boy did they. Roanoke completely iced out the Ice Bears in their home finale on Friday night, taking a 3-0 shutout victory. Austyn Roudebush notched a 28-save shutout, while the Dawgs offense collected three goals around him. 

After a first period that only saw three penalties and no goals, the Dawgs knew they had work to do going into the second. For starters, they needed to finish killing off the second Ice Bears powerplay which they did with ease. Then after a very physical and hard-fought several minutes, Mac Jansen would take a center pass from Tommy Munichiello to get the Dawgs on the board. Shortly after, a 5-minute major would be given to Roanoke’s John Macdonald. He lunged to finish off a hit, striking Knoxville’s Anthony Cinato. Roanoke would finish the period with a 1-0 lead, but they’d have to start the third by killing a 5-minute major penalty. 

Largely off the back of Austin Roudebush making some insane plays, one of which looked impossible, the Dawgs would successfully kill the major penalty. The game would stay close until roughly 2 minutes were left in the game. That’s when the Dawgs would seize the momentum and really open up the offense. With 2:05 left in the game, Roanoke’s Jacob Kelly would come clean and fire a shot on the goalkeeper’s glove side that would make it to the back of the net. Roanoke would take a 2-0 lead on the goal. Not even 30 seconds would pass before Dominicks Marcinkevics would show off some incredible footwork, breaking the goalkeeper’s ankles, and just simply sliding the puck behind him to give the Dawgs a 3-0 lead. The game would end shortly after under a sea of Dawgs fans cheers. 

Roudebush secured his 25th win of the year to break his single-season record from the 2022-2023 campaign, and the attendance of 6,271 fans secured a second-place finish for regular season attendance for Roanoke across the SPHL. Truly, this has been a historic season already for The Rail Yard Dawgs and it’ll be interesting to see what they can do in the SPHL playoffs. The Rail Yard Dawgs and the Knoxville Ice Bears will both head on over to Knoxville on Saturday, April 6th for the final game of the SPHL season.