Petes outscored on second night of road trip
Sarnia Sting hands team second loss of the weekend
SARNIA – Southwestern Ontario proved to be an inhospitable place for the Peterborough Petes.
The Petes were outscored 14-6 in identical 7-3 losses to the Sarnia Sting on Saturday night and the London Knights on Friday night.
The Petes fell behind 3-0 in the first period against Sarnia after being outscored 4-0 in the opening frame in London. On both nights starting goalie Hunter Jones, who has started 21 of the Petes 23 games, was pulled after the fifth goal. Petes’ forward Semyon Der-Arguchintsev was benched for a second time in three games in the third period. He was minus-five on the night.
Sarnia (8-10-2-2) snapped a seven-game losing streak in handing the Petes (12-11-0) their fourth loss in five games after opening the weekend with a 4-3 overtime win at home against the Owen Sound Attack.
The Petes will return home 7:05 p.m. Thursday when they host the Kingston Frontenacs.
“I’m disappointed tonight,” said Petes head coach Rob Wilson. “We really did a lot of things we weren’t doing at the start of the season. We were giving away outnumbered rushes like it was candy on Halloween. We said to Sarnia, ‘Here you go. Here are some more trick or treats.”
Sarnia has struggled defensively but Wilson said he warned his team they were quick and could score.
“I’m a little lost for words to understand how we could think it was OK to play this way because we certainly didn’t have a meeting like that. The message back from the players was that they understood we couldn’t play like that.
“We didn’t have a high forward. We had defencemen making bad decisions in the neutral zone. We got outworked around our net. Their guys were going to our net hard. It’s not a great time to play a team when they’ve lost seven in a row because there is a time they’re going to come out of it.”
The Sting onslaught started 5:16 into the game when Marko Jakovijevic’s point shot deflected in off Anthony Salinitri’s skate. Sarnia went up by two on a power play at 9:45 when Franco Sproviero put a shot past a screened Jones.
Ex-Pete Nick Grima assisted on the third goal with 4:49 left in the first. Hugo Leufvenius potted Grima’s rebound off a point shot.
Veteran defenceman Austin Osmanski said his team didn’t play to its capabilities in either road game.
“We just didn’t come ready. It’s all over the board from not being accountable to guys not doing their job,” said Osmanski. “I think the biggest thing is we’ll have a good shift and we’ll take the next one off. To beat good teams and to be a good team you can’t do that. You have to play a solid 60 minutes and when you have a good shift you need to follow with a better one. If you do have a bad shift it has to stop there, it can’t carry on.”
City native Calvin Martin picked up a goal and assist in the second period in building the Sting lead to 5-0. Martin took a shot that hit the post and Brayden Guy bunted the puck in out of the air at 2:16. Guy returned the favour setting up Martin on a two-on-one break 6:11 later.
The Petes replaced Jones after five goals on 27 shots at the midway mark of the second. For a second night in a row rookie goalie Tye Austin did an admirable job in relief. He robbed Leufvenius with a pad save on an opportunity soon after entering.
The Petes didn’t generate a ton of chances but Sting goalie Aidan Hughes stopped Chris Paquette and Brady Hinz on Grade A opportunities. Mitch Eliot converted a two-on-one pass from Ryan McGregor 31 seconds into the third period making it 6-0.
Chad Denault tried to liven things up with a fight and the Petes ended up scoring a pair 20 seconds apart. Cameron Butler blew a shot off the wing past Hughes at 8:09. Adrien Beraldo scored on a long slapshot. Beraldo also got into a third period fight.
Curtis Egert put a backhand past Austin at 13:42 on a power play. Max Grondin got his second goal as a Pete in the final minute redirecting Pavel Gogolev’s pass.
NOTES: The three stars were 1. Franco Sproviero (S); 2. Jacob Perreault (S); 3. Marko Jakovijevic (S)… The hardest working Pete was Liam Kirk.