Wednesday, July 8, 2015

Lakers and Chiefs win close games to remain atop MSL standings

Colin Doyle's back with the Six Nations Chiefs and helped them to an 11-7
win over KW in his first game of the summer.
It wasn't easy in either case, but the Peterborough Lakers and Six Nations Chiefs won games Monday and Tuesday, respectively, to pull a little further ahead of the pack atop the MSL standings.

Peterborough used a 4-goal third-period run to beat the Oakville Rock 7-5 Monday night after a rare scoreless first period. It was actually Oakville's second scoreless period in a week; they beat Brooklin 7-4 last Monday in a game where neither team scored in the third period.

Oakville took a 3-1 lead in the second period but the Lakers tied it up with goals from Scott Evans and Turner Evans in the final two minutes of the frame. They were playing without their third Evans--Shawn Evans was ejected from the game as the third man into a scuffle after coming to his brother's aid when Tim O'Brien cross-checked Scott's helmet off his head and was trying to fight the older sibling.

Jeremy Noble's second goal of the game, on the power play, gave Oakville the lead again just 36 second into the third period. Curtis Dickson got that one back under two minutes later then Josh Currier struck for back to back goals to give Peterborough what must have felt like a huge 2-goal cushion in a game where scoring was so hard to come by.


The Lakers got a bit of a break 25 seconds after Currier's second goal, although it may not have felt very lucky to Robert Hope at the time. An Oakville shot rang off of the defender's helmet and bounced up to centre floor, where Stephen Hoar had just stepped out of the penalty box from matching minor roughing penalties with Bill Hostrawser.

Hoar grabbed the ball, charged to the net and picked the corner to make it 7-4. Goalie Evan Kirk and the Lakers defence took it from there, although Noble did manage to complete his hat trick before the midway point of the third.

Tuesday, it was another lower-rung team giving a league leader fits as the KW Kodiaks gave the Six Nations Chiefs all they could handle for two and a half periods before the Chiefs went on a 4-goal run to win 11-7 and regain sole possession of first place.

Six Nations led 3-2 after the first but KW ran off three straight goals from Luke Laszkiewicz, Mitch Wilde and Scott DeFrancesco to pull ahead. Jeff Shattler scored three times in the second half of the second, including a shorthanded marker, to even things up at 7-7 heading into the final 20 minutes.

Ryan Benesch broke the deadlock with a power play goal at the 9:38 mark of the third period and the Chiefs followed that up with goals from Kasey Beirnes, Benesch and Colin Doyle, with his first of the season in his first game this summer.

Davide DiRuscio made 46 saves for KW as the Chiefs outshot their visitors 57-36. KW is back in action tonight when they visit Brooklin in a game you can see live via JVI Sports Network; click on the link in the right hand column of this site to watch the game.