The Guelph Storm of the Ontario Hockey League could not dig themselves out of an early hole against the visitors from Mississauga.
Chas Sharpe scored twice for the Steelheads in a 3-2 victory over the Storm Friday night at the Sleeman Centre.
The story early in the game was the performance of Mississauga’s rookie netminder Jack Ivankovic. The Steelheads’ first-round pick (7th overall) in the 2023 OHL draft made some big saves in the first period when Guelph was on the power play on three occasions.
“He’s 16 but we still feel confident with him no matter what,” Sharpe said of Ivankovic. “He’s a stud of a goalie and we feel comfortable when he’s in net.”
Ivankovic’s stellar play continued in the second period when he stopped 15 shots.
Sharpe put the Steelheads up 1-0 at 8:19 of the first period. His second goal of the game came on a Mississauga power play at the 14:19 mark to put Mississauga ahead 2-0.
“We’ve been focusing on the penalty kill, in video and in practice,” said Sharpe whose team is now 5-1-0-0 on the new season. “I think just to come out with a win with that many penalties is huge.”
The Steelheads would go up 3-0 in the third on a goal by Angus MacDonell before Max Namestnikov gave the Storm some life with his first of the season on the power play at the 9:17 mark.
“We can’t take those opportunities for granted,” said Namestnikov on the Storm’s early power play struggles. “We got one to get the guys going but we couldn’t finish.”
Storm captain Braeden Bowman would score later in the period to cut the deficit down to one but Ivankovic closed the door the rest of the way making a total of 35 saves in the game.
On the other end of the ice, Brayden Gillespie stopped 23 shots for the Storm (3-2-0-0) who have now lost two straight.
“I think we came out slow tonight, we weren’t ready, we weren’t prepared,” said Namestnikov. “We made that goalie look good from the start. So I think we have to come out way better.”
Guelph went 1-for-6 with the man advantage while Mississauga scored once on two power play opportunities.
The next game for the Storm is Saturday night when they head across the border to Flint, Mich., to take on the Firebirds.
Listen to the game on 1460 CJOY. The pre-game show begins at 6:45 p.m. and Larry Mellott will have the call starting at 7 p.m.
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