SPITS FIRE BLANKS AGAINST KNIGHTS
KNIGHTS BLANK SPITS Windsor drops 3rd straight
Many expected the Windsor Spitfires to struggle with a young lineup this season.
While the club was able to prove the pundits wrong early in the season, those struggles have become more evident in recent games.
For the first time this season, the Spitfires are riding a threegame losing streak after Sunday’s 4-0 loss to the London Knights before 5,173 at the WFCU Centre.
“We knew there would be adversity,” said Spitfires head coach Trevor Letowski, whose team has lost five of its last six games.
“To be honest, I’m surprised it took this long to get it.”
For the most part, the bulk of the team’s offence has been limited to a handful of veteran players. When those players are held in check, as was the case on Sunday, the club’s younger and less experienced players have not been able to step up and fill the void.
“You’ve got to score goals to win games,” Spitfires overage defenceman Austin McEneny said.
“We had 34 shots, but you’ve got to put the puck in the back of the net. Our top line can’t be scoring all our goals. We’ve got to have a little more depth here.”
The three-game losing streak came against three of the better club’s in the Ontario Hockey League in Owen Sound, Sarnia and London.
“You can argue those are the best three teams in the league that we just played and we had chances to win every game,” said Spitfires’ captain Aaron Luchuk, whose team could not protect a lead against Owen Sound and Sarnia.
But the reality is that the Western Conference has been the league’s toughest for years now and that’s not likely to change for the Spitfires or make the learning process any easier as the season goes on.
“For (the young players), the grind’s starting to kick in a little bit for the season,” Luchuk said. “It’s hard to describe for them because they figure it’s just a game.”
But as the season wears, the intensity picks up and Windsor has not been able to match the opposition in recent games.
“We have to try and string 60 minutes together,” Letowski said.
On Sunday, Cliff Pu redirected a point shot past Spitfires’ goalie Mikey DiPietro for the only goal of the opening period on a London power play.
“It’s tough, especially when you’re desperate looking for a win, and you give up one like that and it sets you back,” Letowski said of the early deficit.
Windsor tried to make a push in the second period, but Luchuk watched a pair of his shots ring off the post behind London goalie Joseph Raaymakers, who has helped the Knights go 9-2-10 since his arrival in a trade with the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds.
“There were times earlier in the year where those two posts go in,” said Luchuk, whose team lost for the first time in four meetings against the Knights this season.
“Obviously, Raaymakers makes a huge difference for them. Awful start (to the season for London), but that wasn’t their team. It’s a good team and Raaymakers made a big difference. He made some big stops, but that’s a good team over there.”
But no one on the Spitfires could beat Raaymakers as the Spitfires were blanked for third time this season and second in six games.
“It’s a unique situation with our group,” Letowski said. “Outside of the top few guys, we’re still trying to get defined roles of who are our second-line players and who can we kind of count on. No one’s really stepped up there.”
London’s Tyler Rollo scored off a Windsor turnover late in the second period and Max Jones scored on a power play to put the Knights up 3-0 after two periods before Pu tipped in his second of the game to close the scoring in the third period.
“Kind of a bitter taste losing three in a row this weekend,” Luchuk said. “We feel we definitely deserved a little bit better fate this weekend, for sure, but it’s kind of our first real adversity we’ve faced as a group and we’ll learn from it as a group and hopefully grow from it.”