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 The
Sarnia Sting Midget A team took on the
Whitby Wildcats in their first game of the
Silver Stick tournament, and with a dramatic finish,
the Sting lost 3-2.
The
Wildcats struck first quickly in the first period
just twenty-four seconds in, as Ryan Hopley picked
up a miss-handled puck in front of the net and put
it into the wide open cage to make it 1-0. The rest
of the period was a hard hitting--fast paced game,
with both teams getting their chances to notch more
goals on the scoreboard, but neither could solve the
goalies as the period ended 1-0.
In
the second period, Sarnia got more pressure, getting
shots onto the net on the powerplay, but they were
turned away. Sarnia's best chance came when Chris
Ferrera
took a lose puck on the penalty kill from a defender
who had fallen and raced in on goalie, Dave Podesta,
but his deke could not get by him, and the score
remained 1-0 after two periods of play.
In
the third, the Wildcats would increase their lead to
two, as Kevin MacAuley keeps the puck on a two on
one and wrists a shot over the glove of Sarnia
goaltender Andrew Ganter. But it didn't take long
for the Sting to respond, as Ferrera would get a
second chance, this time banging a puck that came
around the boards and out front of the net home, to
get the Sting on the board and cut the lead to just
one.
Unfortunately for the Sting, with 4:50 remaining in
the period, they are handed a five minute major
penalty, and would spend the rest of the game on the
penalty kill. They would also take a two minute
roughing penalty to put them down to 5 on 3. The
Wildcats couldn't respond, and after the two minutes
penalty expired, Sarnia pulled their goalie and
raced down into the Wildcats zone. The puck is
played along the side boards, and after being pushed
back and forth, finds its way onto Dan Hubbard's
stick in the slot, who snaps a wrist shot over the
glove of Podesta with twenty-seven seconds remaining
in the period to tie the game at 2-2.
But
the Sting would suffer heart-break after battling
back, as they still remained on the 5 on 4 because
of the major and it would finally come back to haunt
them. As they play began in the Wilcats zone off a
faceoff, the puck was moved down the ice. Tyler
Gilligan had the puck for the Wilcats, and as he
crossed the blue line with time expiring, he let a
wrist shot go, that had shades of Steve Yzerman's
double overtime slap shot against St. Louis, as it
fooled Ganter with two seconds remaining, and erased
the Stings comeback.
This was Sarnia's first game in the tournament, and
they will play two more on Saturday. Their first
match is at 7:00a.m. against the
Ted Reeve Thunder at the RBC Centre, while
their second game is at 3:30p.m. against the Howard
Huskies, also at the RBC Centre.
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