Jr. A Lakers notch first win
Complete team effort leads to first defeat of the season for visiting Six Nations Arrows
That’s more like it. The Peterborough Merit Precision Junior A Lakers flipped the script on a tough start to the season, playing a complete team game to down the previously undefeated Six Nations Arrows 10-6 at the Memorial Centre on Tuesday night.
Jake Fox led the offence with two goals and two assists while transition player Nick Finlay scored a hat trick, including an empty netter on which he rolled the ball the length of the floor into the middle of the cage.
The defensive unit played its best game of the season to keep the potent Arrows in check. It helped Peterborough’s cause that Arrows’ scoring star Austin Staats sat out with a lower body injury.
Drew Hutchison got his first Junior A win in his first Junior A start. He was solid between the pipes and sparked the Lakers transition game with his long passing ability. In the second and third periods, Six Nations often had a forward coming to the bench early to guard against Hutchison’s passing.
“We had 17 guys that wanted to work their butts off to win tonight. Everyone pulled the rope together, there were no passengers,” said Lakers head coach Ken Watson. “It was a complete game from goaltending to defence to offence. Our communication was good, our effort was good on and off the floor at both ends.”
The Lakers didn’t allow a set offence goal for over 30 minutes. Peterborough led 4-2 after the first period with both Six Nations goals coming in transition. After the Arrows did score a regular offence goal at 10:37 of the second period, Peterborough responded with a flurry of three goals in 37 seconds.
They never let up, continuing to play the relentless style that had gotten them the lead.
“For a group of young guys and a couple of veterans, I thought the guys managed the floor very well considering Six Nations can be a very dangerous team,” Watson said.
Jake McNabb scored a power play goal and an extra attacker goal late in the game to pull Six Nations within 9-6, but the Lakers never panicked and they held on for a win that gives them a huge confidence boost, although Hutchison said the team didn’t lose its positive attitude even through a four-game seasonopening losing streak.
“What we’ve been saying is every day’s a new day. We’re a new team every game and we have new players in the lineup,” Hutchison said. “Our mood’s still really high. We want to be one of the top teams in the league and we know we’re going to be.”
As Watson said, it was one game, but the Lakers looked far more like a team that can compete with anyone in Ontario than they had so far this season.