Thunderbirds split games on home ice
Submitted By Brad Coccimiglio on Monday, February 20, 2012
A three-point weekend for the Soo Thunderbirds meant a Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League title.
A win over the Soo (MI) Eagles on Friday night was the first order of
business and they got that done with a 6-5 victory at the Essar Centre.
With that in the rear view mirror, the Thunderbirds then needed just a
single point against the Abitibi Eskimos on Sunday afternoon to clinch
the title. Instead, they came up on the short end of a 4-3 decision.
In what has become typical Thunderbirds/Eagles fashion, the two teams battled down to the wire with Corey Jackson being the hero for the Thunderbirds, netting the game winner with 21 seconds left on the clock to give the Thunderbirds the win. The goal came after Josh Borgen tied the game for the Eagles 1:09 earlier with the Eagles on the power play after a minor penalty to Jeremy Solomon of the Thunderbirds.
“We were way too undisciplined (Saturday afternoon),” said Thunderbirds coach Jamie Henderson, who was filling in for coach Preston Mizzi. Mizzi was suspended following an incident at Pullar Stadium in the Michigan Sault last weekend that saw him go on the ice to criticize the referees following a loss to the Eagles.
“We played, for the most part, a great hockey game when we could stay five-on-five,” continued Henderson. “We kind of lost our composure there in the last ten minutes.”
Said Eagles coach Bruno Bragagnolo: “We should have won that game but we gave (the Thunderbirds) way too many easy goals, plain and simple. We had some bad defensive lapses that cost us the game.
Micky Sartoretto led the Thunderbirds in the win with a pair of goals and an assist in the win. Kurtis Barbarie, Kevin Michelcavage and Jake Wright added a goal and an assist each in the win while Greg Sartoretto and Fraser Turner added two assists each in the win.
Brian Depp had a pair of goals for the Eagles while Aaron Leach and Travis Payne also scored for the Eagles.
Against Abitibi, discipline again was an issue in the loss.
Richard Therrien scored the game-winner for Abitibi early in the third period with Jake Wright in the penalty box serving a slashing minor. Therrien finished the night with two goals and an assist while Marc-Alain Begin had three assists in the win. Preston Lacasse had the other goal for the Eskimos.
Barbarie, Michelcavage and Greg Sartoretto scored for the Thunderbirds in the loss.
“It was a frustrating game to be honest,” said Henderson. “When we were in their zone, we battled and worked hard but the same old story for us lately is undisciplined penalties. I’m not sure how many penalties we took but it seemed like we were in the box for half the game. You get a little bit of momentum and then someone takes a bad penalty or a selfish penalty and then you have to kill it.”
“All in all we were happy to play the way we did,” said Eskimos coach Paul Gagne. “It’s a time of the year where the boys are really clamping down and minimizing our mistakes so it was a really good weekend for us.”
With Matt Amadio already out serving a suspension, the Thunderbirds were forced to play Sunday’s game without Micky Sartoretto, who was serving the first of a two-game suspension stemming from a gross misconduct he received at the end of Saturday’s game against the Eagles.
Mizzi, Amadio and Sartoretto all have one game remaining on their respective suspensions while no timeframe has been set on Henderson’s possible suspension. Henderson faces a two-game suspension. Following Saturday’s game, with the incident leading to Sartoretto’s suspension wrapping up, players from the Thunderbirds began to come on the ice to celebrate the win, prior to be given the ok from referees. Henderson was subsequently handed a game misconduct for leaving the bench without clearance from the referee.
The Thunderbirds wrap up their regular season with three games in three days beginning on Friday night at Kirkland Lake against the Gold Miners. On Saturday, the Thunderbirds face Abitibi before wrapping up the season in North Bay on Sunday evening.
