There wasn’t much Christmas spirit between the Storm and the Petes of the Ontario Hockey League Friday night.
The rather chippy game at the Sleeman Centre ended up with Guelph taking it by a 7-5 score over the visitors from Peterborough.
The game started off well for the Petes as they took a 2-0 lead 10 minutes into the first period on goals by Jax Dubois and Konnor Smith.
After exchanging goals in the second period, the Storm fired four unanswered markers past Petes’ netminder Liam Sztuska (27 saves) and grabbed a 5-3 lead after two periods.
“I guess maybe we thought we won the game (after the first period),” said Dubois on his team’s effort in the second period. “I didn’t think we played too bad. I think if we worked on our second period, we would have been good.”
Despite the momentum swing the reigning OHL champs would not go down quietly. Dubois (3 goals, 1 assist) completed the hat trick scoring his second and third goals for the Petes 42 seconds apart in the third period to tie it up at 5-5.
But Braeden Bowman (1 goal, 1 assist) would knock in his 16th of the season on the power play at the 5:15 mark to put the Storm up by one. That was followed by Max Namestnikov’s (2 goals) second of the game to give Guelph a 7-5 lead.
“The momentum was going our way heading into the third period,” Namestnikov said. “They kind of bounced back… to tie it up. Then the momentum went back to our side and (we) had it towards the end.”
Namestnikov had several chances to collect his own hat trick including one late in the third with the Petes’ net empty but he could not bury the puck on a wrap-around.
“Personally, I enjoy it more,” said Namestnikov on the number of goals scored. “It’s a lot more fun, more competitive. Guys were kind of going at it, chirping each other.”
There were a pair of fights mixed in, both the result of questionable hits by the Petes. Chandler Romeo dropped the gloves with Sam McCue after McCue sent Leo Serlin into the boards from behind in the first period.
Then Rylan Singh and Braydon McCallum (1 goal, 1 assist) got into it in early the third after Michael Buchinger received a headshot from McCallum. McCallum ended up receiving a 5-minute major and an ejection from the game.
Jake Karabella (1 goal, 2 assists), Buchinger (1 goal, 1 assist), Charlie Paquette, and Wil McFadden also scored while Jett Luchanko finished with four assists for Guelph – 12 different Storm players collected at least one point in the game.
“I didn’t think we had too many passengers, if any passengers, in the game,” said Storm head coach Chad Wiseman who liked the way his team battled after a slow first period.
“The Grunder-Paquette-McGuire line who checked their top line the second half of the game did a fantastic job playing at their end of the ice.”
Brayden Gillespie stopped 22 shots for the Storm. Guelph (18-12-1-1) scored four times on the power play on six opportunities while Peterborough (14-12-3-1) went 2-for-3.
It is a short turnaround for the Storm as they host the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds for a matinee on Saturday for their teddy bear toss game. Game time is 2 p.m. and it can be heard on 1460 CJOY.
The Petes will play the Generals in Oshawa on Sunday night before the league goes into their Christmas break.