Love might have been in the air Thursday but it was certainly scarce at Memorial Gardens as the North Bay Battalion took on the high flying Sault Ste Marie Greyhounds. As the Pat Benatar song goes, "Love is a Battlefield," and at times the ice surface certainly felt that way as the Troops skated away with a tough 4-3 overtime victory.
“We put a good effort together tonight,” Adam Dennis said post game.
“I think it started yesterday (5-2 loss to the Sudbury Wolves). We came ready to play right from the drop of the puck and our guys stuck with it even though we didn’t get the results yesterday but they put the same work ethic forward tonight and were rewarded.”
The Soo opened the scoring at the 6:32 mark of the first period when Keeghan Howdeshell put the puck past Christian Purboo.
Birthday boy Harrison Caines would reply moments later before Mitchell Russell put the Troops up by one heading into the first intermission.
“It feels unbelievable to score but it was secondary tonight," Caines said.
"The win made my birthday ten times better and it was really exciting."
Leafs prospect Mac Hollowell scored the lone goal in the second to tie the game up. Flyers prospect Morgan Frost of the Greyhounds thought that his team was not playing to their potential heading into the third however.
“It’s pretty disappointing the way we’re playing right now,” Frost said bluntly.
“It’s pretty lackadaisical, our attitude that is, we had way too many turnovers.”
Soo Captain Barrett Hayton gave the Greyhounds the lead in the third, but Brandon Coe tied the game up to make way for the Matthew Struthers overtime winner.
With the Battalion on a 4 on 3 OT power play Justin Brazeau fanned on a shot that Bradley Chenier recovered and made a nifty behind the back pass to Struthers who tapped home the game winner past Ethan Taylor who replaced injured starter Matthew Villalta in the final stanza.
“It feels good,” an out of breath Matt Struthers remarked.
“We know it’s our job to score most nights but when we have an off night, it’s good to have the guys back it up.”
“The guys” being referred to here is Caines, Russell, and Coe picking up the first three goals.
“I feel like you guys ask me this every time,” Dennis joked when approached about the secondary scoring.
“When they’re scoring we are pretty successful so I think the story writes itself.”
We glossed over Purboo earlier but his play did not go unnoticed as he made 35 saves in the effort.
“I’m getting much more comfortable as I play games but we had a good preparation today,” Purboo said.
“I feel like our preparation has gotten better throughout and we knew these guys are good and came out flying,” the big goaltender added.
“I’m trying to think if there are many goalies who have beaten the Soo Greyhounds twice this year.” Dennis added, referring also to the October 14th game in which the Troops won 3-2 in overtime as well.
“You need your goalie to be good to beat those guys and he was. It’s not easy when you’re not getting the starts on a regular basis so it’s a credit to what he does in practice.”
The Battalion are back in action Sunday when they welcome the divisional rival Mississauga Steelheads to town.
