The Byron Center hockey team had a chance to remain unbeaten and win the OK Rue title outright on Friday night, hosting Grandville at Southside Ice Arena.
It would be a 2-1 Byron Center lead after one period of play before Andrew Pohlmann scored for Grandville to knot the game in the second period and teammaate Gavin Rozema helped the Bulldogs take the 3-2 lead just minutes later.
Grandville would carry that 3-2 lead into the second intermission.
In the third, Connor Braate would score with 9:34 left in regulation to knot the game at three.
Minutes later, Braate would bury yet another to give Byron Center the 4-3 lead before Pohlmann netted the equalizer with just 17 seconds left to send the game to overtime, tied at four.
In overtime, Byron Center's Nik Schepers would net the game-winner to give the Bulldogs the 5-4 win, helping them improve to 13-0 on the season and win the OK Rue outright.
"I'm not going to lie, man, my knees were shaking pretty hard," Schepers laughed after the win, "I love every other senior on this team, I've been blessed with such an amazing group of people. It's the great feeling in the world to have these people on my back," he added.
And the Bulldogs finished dead last in the OK Rue last season, despite their postseason success. Head coach Taylor Keyworth says his team took that personally.
"One of our main goals was to win conference," said Keyworth after the win, "we thought we had a great team last year and I think we did, but maybe our conference play wasn't up to snuff. This year, we really turned things around and it feels good because our guys worked really, really hard."
