Gallant effort gives Petes a win over Hounds
New Petes captain gets a hat trick in 5-2 victory as Petes improve their record to 4-1 and maintain grasp on first place
Zach Gallant wore the C well Thursday night.
In his first game as Peterborough Petes captain, Gallant scored a hat trick including the winning goal in a 5-2 victory over the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds before 2,372 fans at the Memorial Centre.
Gallant broke a 2-2 tie with 3:29 left after Nick Isaacson stole the puck and fed him in the Greyhounds zone. Chad Denault and Gallant added empty-net goals in the final three minutes. Hunter Jones rebounded from getting pulled in a 7-1 loss to the Hamilton Bulldogs on Saturday with 34 saves as the Petes improved to 4-1 on the season.
The Greyhounds came in with a 2-1-1-0 record despite losing a pile of players off last year’s team which finished first overall before losing in the OHL final including Boris Katchouk, Taylor Raddysh, Jack Kopacka, Connor Timmins, Rasmus Sandin and Peterborough native Barrett Hayton.
Hayton is on injured reserve with the NHL’s Arizona Coyotes to start the season with an upper body injury.
It was also former Petes captain Jamie Tardif’s first trip back to Peterborough since joining the Greyhounds as an assistant coach in the off-season. Tardif retired after an 11 year pro playing career after last season.
The first period was scoreless with both goaltenders having strong moments. The Petes ran up an early 8-2 edge In shots but the Soo had 13 of the next 15.
The Petes survived a lengthy five-on-three Greyhounds power play with Jones make a couple of big stops midway through the period. He stopped Joe Carroll and then stretched to snag the rebound off Carroll.
The Petes two best scoring chances didn’t end up on net.
The Petes broke through 36 seconds into the second period with an assist to the hometown square corners. Austin Osmanski’s dump-in took a favourable bounce off the boards out front where Brady Hinz quickly moved it to the far post where Pavel Gogolev tucked it past Matthew Villalta for his first goal of the season.
The Soo tied it at 10:29 when Zack Trott cut in on Petes defenceman Cole Fraser and went forehand to backhand to lift the puck past Jones.
The teams went into the second intermission tied 1-1 and deadlocked 27-27 on the shot clock.
Gallant put the Petes ahead
1:37 into the third period with his first goal of the season. Isaacson did the work to fight off a check behind the Soo net to feed Adam Timleck whose pass was onetimed by Gallant past Villalta.
Morgan Frost made no mistake on a short-handed breakaway with 7:53 left in the third period snapping a shot past Jones to tie it. It came after Cullen McLean dove to knock a puck loose that
Frost skated onto.
NOTES: The three stars were 1. Hunter Jones (P); 2. Zach Gallant (P); 3. Matthew Villalta (S).… The hardest working Pete
was Matt McNamara.… A fan bus is heading to the Petes game against the Mississauga Steelheads on Oct. 19. The cost is $55 for bus and game ticket. The deadline to sign up is Oct. 10. Call Julia Tanner at 705-977-0127.