A shot from the left point by defenceman Igor Chibrikov with 1:11 left in regulation went over the shoulder of a screened Battalion goaltender Julian Sime, breaking a 5-5 tie as the Owen Sound Attack went on to edge the North Bay Battalion 6-5 at Memorial Gardens on Sunday afternoon.
The Attack counter attack was lethal on this day as the visitors scored three times right after a Battalion goal to even the score at 2-2, 3-3 and 5-5 until Chibrikov netted the late game-winner.
The loss drops the Troops pre-season record to 3-2-1 while The Attack moves its flawless pre-season record to 5-0.
"They are a veteran team over there and we knew they were going to be tough today and yesterday," said Battalion Assistant Coach Scott Wray, who ran the bench with Adam Dennis while Head Coach Stan Butler watched from the stands.
"I thought the power play looked a little bit better getting pucks on net. We were making little mistakes and with a team like that they capitalize quick and a couple of their goals were tic-tac-toes because guys are just running around instead of playing their positions. So we just need to clean that up before Friday," said Wray about the home opener which is this Friday against the Barrie Colts.
For Wray, it was his first opportunity back at Memorial Gardens involved in an OHL game since he played for the Centennials in the late 1990's.
"I didn't really have a lot of time to think about it," said Wray, who guided the Powassan Voodoos to a NOJHL championship last year.
It did not start well for the Troops as physical defender Eric Allair was assessed a five-minute major for head contact and game misconduct for a questionable hit just inside the blueline less than 10 minutes into the game that seemed to put the Battalion on its heels.
Late in that power play, Sean Durzi ripped a screenshot through traffic and past Mat Woroniuk for a 1-0 Owen Sound lead on the 5th Attack shot of the game.
The power play goal came in the final 20 seconds of the major but the power play may have continued past the five minute mark because no player was sent to the box after Allair was given the game misconduct for the hit.
"Not putting a guy in the box almost bit me in the butt because nobody was in there and we would have been killing even longer so that was a little nerve-wracking," Wray said about the oversight.
In the opening frame, the Troops were getting beat to the puck which caused the majority of the play in the Battalion end.
However, a late first-period period hit by Riley Bruce got the Battalion rolling again.
Late in the period Adam Thilander took a seeing-eye wrist shot from the blue line, which was tipped by Daniel Walker, and eluded Zack Bowman. It was the Troops third shot of the period and evened things as 1-1 after one.
The Battalion got their first lead on an early second-period power play as North Bay product Payton Vescio beat Bowman blocker-side 49 seconds into the middle frame.
The Attack attack quickly tied the game as Ethan Szypula scored on a rebound on a 3 on 2 rush which made it 2-2.
The Battalion got it back on a 3 on 2 of their own as Thilander put home a nice feed from Lucas Burghardt to make it 3-2 Troops at 13:32 of the second.
The Attack bounced back and made it 3-3 as Matthew Struthers converted a nice passing play to even things at 3-3 at 14:09.
Luke Burghardt buried a feed in the slot past Bowman to make it 4-3 with less than three minutes remaining in the middle frame.
Early in the third Struthers deflected in a shot past Sime for his second of the game, to make it 4-4.
Sime replaced Woroniuk after the second period.
Mid third period Luke Burghardt picked up a rebound on the glove side of Zack Bowman and put it home which made it 5-4 Troops.
The Attack again scored on the following shift after a goal as Maksim Sushko converted a Szypula feed to even things at 5-5 less than a minute later.
That set up the timely goal by Chibrikov.
The Troops pull Sime with just over 1:30 remaining, but a late tripping call on Luke Burghardt with the net empty killed any Troops chance of getting the equalizer.