Thanks to injury or suspension, the North Bay Battalion have been down a man or two in one way or another all season.
But playing with as close to a full platoon that they have had yet against the Flint Firebirds on Sunday afternoon, it seemed only fitting that the Troops flourished and thrived when down a man, as the North Bay brigade overcame a flood of early penalties to finish off a perfect weekend with a 6-3 win at Memorial Gardens.
After entering the game as the seventh-least penalized team in the league, the Battalion’s four-man unit was called upon early and often in the penalty-filled affair, shutting the door on six Flint power plays including a five-minute major and an extended 5-on-3 in the early going.
“I thought we were playing a really good game and then we ran into a couple speed bumps in the second period, and I think we all know who the speed bumps were,” Battalion head coach Stan Butler said after the game.
“We had to overcome that and once we did that, even though we had some bad bounces in the third period, what I was happy about was that we actually responded and found a way to win the hockey game,” he added.
Leading the charge was Mathew Santos, who had a hand in almost every Battalion goal with two goals and three assists. Linemate Mike Amadio also continued to impress by scoring two goals and an assist, while defenceman Miles Liberati chipped in with three assists.
“For me personally, I’m just starting to click with my linemates and defencemen, plus I keep getting a few lucky bounces,” Santos said after the game. “Each and every game I’m starting to get better and I’m getting more confident in my abilities. The suspension early on in the season was a little bit of a setback for me, not the way I wanted to start, but I took it as a sign to keep working hard.”
An outstanding passing play by Liberati to set up Max Kislinger halfway through the final frame proved to be the game-winning goal, the rookie’s first career deciding goal and fourth of the season for the German import.
But it was captain Amadio who launched the offensive again once again, scoring just four minutes into the game after settling a scrambling puck on a dominant shift by the Battalion for the early lead.
Amadio, whose leadership has been nothing short of stellar through the team’s injury adversity, has now either scored or assisted the Troops’ first goal of the game in seven of the last 10 tilts.
“He’s a clutch player,” Butler said of his leader. “It’s an old adage in hockey: your best players need to be your best players and the two guys we rely on most up front are probably [Amadio] and Santos, and they both had pretty good games today.”
Despite spending a large part of the early going on the penalty kill, the Battalion continued stormed out of the gate with two more first period goals, including another shorthanded marker from Santos, the team’s league-leading 13th of the season.
Santos extended the team’s remarkable three-game shorthanded scoring streak by driving hard to the net on a rush with Miles Liberati, who fired a low, hard pass into the slot for the one goal lead off of Santos’ stick.
Santos then rounded out the period with his second goal of the game, even though he didn’t realized he had scored until his linemates flooded to him in celebration. Santos, looking to centre the puck, spun and fired a cross-ice pass from the left faceoff circle that took a bizarre bounce into the back of the net.
The Battalion took control in the first period and, had they been able to better-coordinate their offensive zone entries, could have padded the lead even further.
But they had a slippery start to the second period, with first-line forward Daniil Vertiy being ejected just 11 seconds into the frame for hitting from behind, setting the tone for more Battalion penalty killing.
“It just takes the momentum out of the game,” Butler said of the penalty calls. “We lose a guy in the game that I don’t think we should’ve lost and then from there we just get socked with a bunch.
“We’ve got a good penalty kill and we score the odd goal on the penalty kill, but it still takes your momentum away,” he continued. “You’ve got to use certain guys too much, other guys sit too long, and it really hurts you going forward.”
After staying steadfast when shorthanded all period, the Battalion finally slipped on the least-threatening of Flint’s offensive rushes as forward Francesco Vilardi’s centring attempt redirected in the North Bay net off of Zach Shankar’s stick late in the period.
Vilardi then followed that up with his second of the afternoon after a long shot on the North Bay net bounced right into his path, which he put home upstairs on Jake Smith to narrow the lead to one.
The Firebirds upped the ante late in the game with another goal from team-leader Will Bitten, but Kislinger’s heroic finish moments before negated any fight Flint had left.
Amadio’s second tally with less than three minutes remaining was the enough to lift the Battalion over the Flint flock, while Brett McKenzie would also go on to add an empty-net goal in the final minute, his tenth goal of the season, to put the game well out of reach.
In the end, the Flint power play went 0-for-6, while the North Bay boys capitalized on one of their four man-advantage opportunities.
Butler was also full of praise for his young forward line of Kyle Potts, Justin Brazeau and Kislinger, nicknaming them the IQ line for their hockey smarts and execution of late.
“The three of them are extremely smart and they play well as a threesome - they’re stronger as a group of three guys than one guy,” said Butler. “They’re probably the one line that plays exactly the way we want to play all the time.”
North Bay native and first round OHL Priority Selection pick Brady Lyle made his regular season debut for the Troops on Sunday, pairing up with Zach Shankar in a minus-one performance.
With the win, the Troops sit two points back of the Niagara IceDogs for third in the Central Division.
The Troops are riding a three-game winning streak into one of the most challenging road trips of their season next weekend, playing three games in three nights against the Sarnia Sting, Saginaw Spirit and Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds, beginning on Friday night in Sarnia.
“The morale is really high right now coming off a three-win weekend and getting some players back and fitting them into the lineup and getting everyone contributing,” said Santos. “We go into that like every weekend: hoping to win all three. But we’re just focusing on the first game and continuing to build confidence and build on our structure."
