A pair of goals in the first period and two more in the third lifted the Windsor Spitfires to a 4-1 victory over the visiting London Knights on Saturday afternoon.
For the second game in a row, London found themselves fighting back from a deficit, but the magic from Friday in Kitchener failed to carry south.
It took the Knights just shy of 40 minutes to score their first of five goals on Friday night, but their first goal on Saturday afternoon happened a whole lot more quickly. Mitchell Stephens raced across the Windsor blue line on a London power play and snapped a hard shot past Mario Culina, who was pressed into starting after Spitfires starter Michael DiPietro took ill.
Windsor wasted no time tying the score on a power play of their own as Maple Leafs prospect Jeremy Bracco banged in a rebound past London goalie Tyler Parsons to make it 1-1 less than two minutes after the Knights had gone ahead.
Bracco and Parsons won gold together at the World Junior Hockey championship with Team USA.
Mikhail Sergachev of the Spitfires brought home a bronze medal from that tournament and he helped to put Windsor ahead. Sergachev kept the puck in at the blue line as the Knights tried to clear and instead of launching one of his big shots, the Canadiens first rounder side-stepped a defender and dragged the puck to the net. Parsons stopped Sergachev’s shot, but Aaron Luchuk was there to pop in the rebound and Windsor led 2-1.
The score stayed that way until the third period.
Parsons came up large on a pair of London penalty kills, but as the second period expired, Spitfires’ defenceman Jalen Chatfield zoomed across the Knights’ blue line and put a pinpoint slap shot off the post and in to stretch Windsor’s lead to 3-1.
Jeremiah Addison added a final goal to seal a home season series between the teams. London won all three games at Budweiser Gardens. Windsor returned the favour at the WFCU Centre.
The six regular season games between the two teams were near-duplicates, going to overtime twice — once in London and once in Windsor.
The Knights have played six of their last seven games away from home while trucks, concerts and Disney on Ice have taken over Budweiser Gardens. They now have a chance to come back in front of their own fans for back-to-back games on Thursday against Guelph at 7:00 and Friday against Erie at 7:30.
For tickets, call 519-681-0800 x 1, visit the Knights’ Armoury or go online to www.londonknights.com
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