The
Sarnia Legionnaires broke out of their losing streak
in dramatic fashion last night, edging the first
place London Nationals 5-4 in a shootout.
Ilya Arkalov got the winner when he deked the
netminder out of position and poked in a one-handed
shot to clinch the victory.
For
Aralov, it was his third shootout winner of the
campgain. In all, he has a dozen goals, although the
shootout markers don't count in his totals.
Going into the game, the Legion crew was on a three
game losing skid that had dropped it into sixth
place in the nine-team Western Ontario Hockey
Conference.
Playoff spot clinched
With the two points the Legionnaires officially
secured a playoff spot. In the 62-year-history of
junior hockey in the city, no Sarnia Jr. 'B' club
has ever missed the post season.
The
Legionnaires did miss the playoffs in 1969 and 1970
and the old Sarnia Bees did the same thing in 1972,
but all three of those were Tier II Jr. 'A' squads.
Sarnia's Jr. 'B' teams are 60-0 when it comes to
qualifying for the money games.
Scoreless first period
Both teams played hard from the opening faceoff to
the final whistle. And it showed on the scoreboard.
In
fact, neither team could score in the first frame,
although Sarnia had an edge in play.
Brent Sauve opened the scoring with his 10th
of the season early in the second stanza.
With the Legionnaires on the powerplay, Sauve took a
pass from Jesse Drydak and fired a wrist shot into
the top right corner.
Josh Teschke, playing just his third game after
being called up from the Jr. 'C' Mooretown Flags,
made it 2-0 a few minutes later with a nifty
redirect from the side of the cage.
The
opportunistic Nationals scored late in the second
period, then squared matters early in the third.
From there on in it was a back-and-forth struggle
that had the crowd of more than 1,400 on the edge of
their seats.
Sarnia regained the lead at 8:42 of the third when
rookie Jeff Schroeter notched his fourth of the year
with a rising slapshot from the sideboards.
The
Nats tied it again, only to see Brett Thompson score
from close range to give the Legionnaires a 4-3 edge
with less than four minutes left. But the visitors
deadlock matters yet again.
Tanner Tomlinson appeared to score the winner with
less than two minutes to go with a blazing drive
that either hit the post or went in-and-out in a
flash.
The
goal judge turned on the red light, then blinked it
again after the officials allowed the game to
continue.
After overtime solved nothing, the teams went to a
shootout.
Sarnia goalie Kyle Washer turned back all three
London snipers to pave the way for Arkalov's
spectacular play.
Game notes:
·
Sarnia assists were collected by Drydak, Waldie,
Schroeter, Jeff Paulley and Andy Sokol.
·
After the game, Legionnaires coach Dan Rose had
words of praise for big new defenceman Connor
MacIvor, saying, “He did fine. He moved the puck
hard. For his first game, I was very happy with his
play.”
·
Captain Tyler Cicchini missed the game with an upper
body injury but is expected to be back next week.
Defenceman Tanner Ferguson is out with a broken
collar bone.
·
Washer, who made 33 saves, now has a 15-5-1 record.
He is 2-0 against the Nats. The Legionnaires had a
whopping 59 shots on net.
·
Sarnia is now the only team in the league that has a
winning record against the Nats, having posted a
2-0-1 mark against them in three meetings.
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