By Journal Sports Staff

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. – Dominik Shine capped his first career hat trick with a shorthanded penalty shot goal with 17 seconds left to give the Northern Michigan University hockey team a 4-3 victory over host Alabama-Huntsville Friday nigh.

The Wildcats’ win, their first when trailing after two periods this season, enables them to improve to 5-5-5 overall and 4-4-3 in the WCHA.

Shine opened the scoring in the game’s first 10 minutes. Seconds before a Northern Michigan penalty kill was set to expire, he was sprung on a breakaway. He picked up Brock Maschmeyer coming out of the box, but beat UAH goaltender Matt Larose himself to give the Wildcats a 1-0 lead at the 8:17 minute mark.

The Chargers evened the score at 15:03 when Max McHugh, who had a hand in every Alabama-Huntsville goal, buried a booming Brennan Saulnier point shot.

The shot got by NMU’s Atte Tolvanen, who finished the night with 44 saves.

Just 18 seconds later, Northern’s Robbie Payne gained the Charger zone off a center-ice draw and sent a shot on net. Shine was there to bury the rebound.

Alabama-Huntsville then netted two unanswered goals – by Chad Brears and Jetlan Houcher – in the second period to take a 3-2 advantage.

The Wildcats evened the score early in the third period when Kurt Gosselin negated a Charger man advantage by taking a slashing penalty. After winning the resulting offensive zone draw cleanly, Darren Nowick netted the equalizer, skating in on net and rifling a shot past Larose at 4:20.

Shine earned the penalty shot after picking off a Charger pass and racing back the other way on a breakaway, during which he was tripped up. On the penalty shot, he roofed a shot past Larose to give NMU its first victory since Nov. 7.

The Wildcats and Chargers return to the ice at 8:07 today.