SLOW-STARTING 67’S BITTEN BY ICEDOGS
Ottawa juniors forced to play catch-up, falling behind 3-0 in opening 20 minutes
A lousy first period followed by a quick whistle that resulted in a disallowed goal — it was all just another kick in the gonads for the Ottawa 67’s.
On Sunday at TD Place, the sleeping 67’s fell behind 3-0 in the first period, battled back to make it 3-2 and seemed to have tied the game on a short-handed goal by Austen Keating, but there was an lightning-fast whistle while the puck was dropping behind Niagara IceDogs goalie Stephen Dhillon and into the net. Oops. What should have been 3-3 soon became 4-2.
The 67’s lost 5-4 and fell into a seventh-place tie with the IceDogs in a tight battle for one of the OHL East’s eight playoff spots.
Keating scored two other goals during the game, but it was the one that didn’t count that folks were talking about.
“(The ref ) said he thought (the goalie) had it and he blew the whistle,” 67’s head coach Jeff Brown said.
“I asked, ‘Can we go upstairs and see whether the whistle was blown before or after?’ They said it wasn’t a reviewable play. It was an awfully quick whistle. It was a huge turning point, but he thought it was covered.”
“It’s frustrating,” Keating said. “It was a great play by (Patrick White) to get me that pass. That’s (the ref’s) call. I’m not going to talk about that too much. But we also had another 20 to 25 minutes to score and come back and we didn’t.”
Ah, yes — the second and third periods, when the 67’s actually showed up and played hard.
“We lost because we weren’t ready to play,” Brown said. “The first period, we were terrible, we laid an egg. We tried to play catch-up the rest of the way. There are two or three our goalie would like to have back. It doesn’t feel like a game we should have lost.
“You can use the (three games in three days) as an excuse, but excuses are for losers. We certainly didn’t look tired the second and third periods.
“Mentally, we weren’t into the game until the second period, and what a shame. It’s a game that a more mature team, they win that game 5-1 or something.
“Mentally, we need to get stronger. You have to be desperate every time you step on the ice. Before games, you have to prepare and be ready for the puck drop. I guess I can take blame for that, we weren’t ready to compete at the puck drop.”
Niagara opened the scoring 2:16 into the game when Justin MacPherson drove to the net and tipped a pass past Ottawa goalie Olivier Lafreniere for his first OHL goal.
Three minutes later, Ryan Mantha’s blast from the point drifted over Lafreniere’s shoulder and made it 2-0.
After a double minor for highsticking to Mitchell Hoelscher, Niagara’s Johnny Corneil made it 3-0. It took a three-shot flurry by the 67’s in the final seconds of the period to give them five shots for what was largely an uninspired period.
Ottawa scrambled back into the game in the second period with a couple of power-play goals — by Sasha Chmelevski and Keating.
But Aaron Haydon made it 4-2 for Niagara.
Mathieu Foget made it 4-3 at 3:47 but Niagara regained its two-goal lead as Daniel Singer found a loose puck with an Ottawa penalty expiring.
Keating made it 5-4 with 9:30 left.
“I thought, by far, Austen was our best player today,” Brown said. “He was exceptional, maybe his best game all year. He’s going to do some things in this league the next two or three years.”
The 67’s have a home-andhome series with the Kingston Frontenacs Friday and Saturday (with an afternoon game at TD Place). The Barrie Colts come to town on Sunday.
Coming off a weekend where they got four of six points, the 67’s will hope for more success. Getting some early momentum would be huge.
“Our starts haven’t been that strong. It’s taken us 5, 10 minutes to get going,” Keating said. “When you give up three quick ones in the first period, it’s tough to come back.”