Dominant performance over Attack
Owen Sound captain calls out his team fot its ‘embarrassing’ performance
Nick Suzuki called the Owen Sound Attack’s 6-1 loss to the Windsor Spitfires “embarrassing.” The Attack captain wasn’t pulling any punches following his team’s third game of a three-inthree inside the Harry Lumley Bayshore Community Centre on Sunday afternoon
“I just thought it was a brutal game,” Suzuki said.
Added head coach Todd Gill: “The way we played is unacceptable. We paid for it, and we paid for it dearly.”
Jordan Frasca opened the scoring for Windsor 12:11 into the first period, when Owen Sound’s fourth line got caught in its own end. Cole Purboo’s shot bounced off the pads of goaltender Andrew MacLean and onto the stick of Frasca, who tucked it home. Markus Phillips evened the score minutes later with the Attack on a power play. His soft shot seemed to bounce on the ice and fool Spitfires goalie Mike DiPietro.
The goal was Phillips’ 100th Ontario Hockey League point and the Attack’s fourth power-play marker of the weekend.
It was all Windsor from there. “We were coming off our worst effort of the season yesterday,” said Spitfires head coach Trevor Letowski. “We really challenged our guys that this was an important game for us.”
The Spitfires lost 6-1 to the Barrie Colts on Saturday night. Chris Playfair put Windsor up 2-1 before the end of the first period with a nice move to the backhand off a three-on-two rush. Owen Sound struggled to find its legs in the second period, and the Spitfires took advantage. Matthew MacDougall shot through a Brady Lyle screen for his fourth tally of the season at the 10:11 mark, before a Louka Henault shot hit six-foot-nine Curtis Douglas at the side of the goal and beat MacLean.
The Spits led 4-1 with 20 minutes to play.
“They basically dominated us, and we can’t let that happen,” Suzuki said.
Gill took a timeout in the middle of the second frame to try and wake up his team.
“He was trying to fire everyone up,” Suzuki. recalled “As players we have to respond better than that.” Letowski knew Owen Sound was on the wrong side of a threein-three, but he didn’t use it as a motivator with his group.
“I never mentioned it,” he said. “Just where we’re at we need a sense of desperation, and we need to find ways to win games.” Douglas scored his second, and fourth goal of the season, in the third period to put Windsor up 5-1. Will Cuylle fanned on a shot and the change-up floated right to Douglas’ stick.
Fresca then scored his second of the afternoon when a puck bounced over the stick of rookie Nolan Seed as he pinched at the blue-line. The Caledon native won the race to the puck and wired it past MacLean for the Spits’ sixth and final marker.
“We were scoring some goals tonight, but it all came off work on the defensive side of the puck,” said Letowski.
DiPietro stopped 33 of the Attack’s 34 shots on goal while MacLean got in front of 28 of Windsor’s 34 offerings at the net. Gill wasn’t happy with his team’s shift-length on Sunday.
The Attack coach said he was changing lines as quickly as possible in the third period in an effort to keep the legs fresh on the Owen Sound bench.
“They played a smart game. They just dumped and chased the crap out of us,” Gill said. “They played the right way and we didn’t.” Kaleb Pearson was a healthy scratch for the first time this season.
“He has been struggling a little bit,” Gill said. “I think the harder he was trying the more he was cheating.”
The Attack’s coach said he would slot Pearson back into the lineup for the team’s next game.