On Saturday, the Saugeen Shores Novice Rep team travelled to Kincardine to begin their round robin series in the 2010-11 WOAA Twolan Division Consolation Semi-finals. The team came out very flat no doubt due to the long hard fought series versus Goderich, in which they came out on the wrong side of.
Jacob Condy got the team off to a terrific start when he was the recipient of a neutral zone turnover from Kincardine’s Zack Wall, split the defense and finished with a great glove-side deke. The joy was short lived however as Kincardine scored four unanswered goals. Hale Schoneck pulled the Storm back within two scores with yet another end-to-end rush, but Kincardine added two more to virtually put the game away. Dane Heipel rounded out the scoring for the Storm after lifting a hard backhander in to the Kinuck net off a nice feed from Donovan Kewageshig and Sam Flarity. Final score was 7-3.
On Sunday back it Port Elgin, it was a totally different affair. The home-side was more than prepared for the rematch and once again it was Condy providing the first goal of the game almost identical to his goal from Saturday. The Storm dominated play throughout the first period with the excellent play from defensemen Ethan Greig, Reed Stauffer, Carter O’Leary and Schoneck keeping the puck in the offensive end for almost the entire period along with some fierce forechecking from Nic Scott and Nic Lalonde. On one of the few offensive chances the Kinucks were able to generate, they got a very lucky goal, pulling even at ones. Condy struck again for the Storm with twelve seconds to go in the first off of a great feed from Eoin MacKay, to retake the lead.
The Kincardine team must have gotten an earful from coach Ryder Colhoun during the intermission as they came out hard and quickly got two goals to put themselves in the lead by one. Refusing to allow this game to get away from them, the tandem of MacKay and Condy struck again along with help from Schoneck the even up the score at two off of MacKay’s stick. Heipel would get the go ahead goal a short time later with Schoneck assisting on the play for his second assist of the game.
Early in the third, the Storm’s Austin Hagen discovered why it is never a bad idea to put pucks to the net as he was awarded a goal after the Kincardine netminder poorly played the harmless looking shot and had to dig it out from the net. With a two goal lead, the Storm found themselves in the middle of a Kinuck onslaught, as they tried battling back. Kincardine’s leading scorer, Zack Wall got them within one midway through the period and that tally seemed to energize the visitors. Each time the Kinucks would bring the puck into their zone, the Storm would battle hard, create the turnover and clear the puck. With 53 seconds to go, Wall got loose off the side boards in the Storm zone and fired a shot on goalie Jarrett Blue who got just enough of the shot to make it rattle off the post and into the far corner. That would be as close as the game would get as the Storm held them off, securing the much needed victory! The Storm now meet the Walkerton Capitals in a home and home series this coming weekend, needing just one win to move on to the consolation final. Go Storm Go!