Two late goals by Eric Uba lifted the Guelph Storm past the London Knights 3-1 at Budweiser Gardens on Tuesday night.
The loss ended a run of 10 consecutive victories by London going back to Jan. 11.
Uba broke a 1-1 tie with 1:05 remaining in regulation time as Cedric Ralph of the Storm settled a puck down in behind the London net and found Uba in front. The Kitchener native batted the puck behind Brett Brochu to give the Storm the lead and then iced the game as he stole a puck outside the blue line and shot it into the empty net with just over 12 seconds left.
London scored the first goal of the game just 56 seconds after the opening faceoff, when Ottawa Senators draft pick Jonathan Gruden banged in a Ryan Merkley rebound at the side of the Storm net on an early power play. The goal gave Merkley 11 assists over a six-game streak.
Storm goalie Nico Daws turned back every shot that came his way after that as he lived up to his number one spots atop the OHL’s goalie statistics. Daws ranks first in both goals against average and save percentage.
“We came out pretty strong and Daws stood in there,” said Knights assistant coach Dylan Hunter. “I think if we had been able to get a couple more by him we would have had a little breathing room. He did what he does best as a good goalie and kept them in the game and they fought their way back.”
Guelph did not record their first shot on goal until the 14:50 mark of the first period but they kept Brochu busy after that and he came up large for the Knights on some big rebound chances by the Storm. In all, Brochu made 34 saves and Daws made 37.
Hunter admitted when a goalie is making stop after stop it makes things tough as a game wears on.
“Naturally you try to stay loose, but you hold your stick a little more and you start looking for dime-sized holes around the goalie,” he said.
“You end up missing the net a lot.”
London went 1-for-3 on the power play but gave up a short-handed goal to Ben McFarlane that tied the game at 7:28 of the third period. The Knights killed off both Guelph opportunities on the man advantage.
It was London’s first loss on home ice in 2020.
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“The guys are down a bit right now,” said Hunter. “They want to win every game they are in and they knew we had a chance tonight. Fortunately we have older guys who have been there before and I’m sure they will get the younger guys back ready to go again.”
Next up for London is three games in four days in three different cities beginning with a matchup against the Western Conference leading Kitchener Rangers on Friday night at Budweiser Gardens.
Foudy makes his NHL debut with familiar faces around
The Columbus Blue Jackets recalled Knights forward Liam Foudy on Feb. 9 on an emergency basis to help them deal with a rash of injuries that had six players out of their lineup. Foudy was on the ice as the game began and played more than 10 minutes.
The Scarborough native recorded two shots on goal, one that became a tricky save for London-born Curtis McElhinney of the Tampa Bay Lightning. McElhinney and Foudy were part of a whole lot of London connections in the game. It featured Foudy and three former London Knights in Scott Harrington, Patrick Maroon and Mitchell Stephens. (Josh Anderson is a former Knight but did not play due to injury) McElhinny and Boone Jenner (Mossley, Ont.) are from the area.
Zach Werenski was a Knights draft pick and London owned the rights to Sonny Milano who played in the game for the Blue Jackets. He was assigned to the Amerifcan Hockey League instead of the OHL and never played in London.
The 2020 class of the Don Brankley Hall of Fame
Before their game against the Storm on Feb. 11 the London Knights officially inducted six new members into the Don Brankley London Knights Hall of Fame. This year’s class features Gary Unger, Reg Thomas, Brian Bradley, Chris Kelly and Dylan Hunter.
Former London Knights head scout John McDonald was inducted as a builder.
The Don Brankley Hall of Fame was created in 2019 to celebrate the best of the best to have played for the London Knights, as well as to honour the memory of London’s legendary trainer who came to London in 1970 to take history at Western and ended making history of his own.
Brankley was a part of the Knights from 1978 until 2008 and passed away in 2017.
Last year’s inaugural class featured Dennis Maruk, Walt McKechnie, Chris and Tim Taylor, Dave Lowry and Rob Schremp. The selection committee aims to feature a player from each of the decades from the 1960s to the 1990s, and then a player from the 2000s.
Wilde news for Saginaw
The deadline for National Hockey League teams to assign players to Major Junior this year was Feb. 10, 2020. The New York Islanders waited right to the last minute, but they have now made it official.
Big six-foot-three-inch defenceman Bode Wild will finish this season in the Ontario Hockey League with the Saginaw Spirit. Wilde had played 20 games for the Bridgeport Sound Tigers (the Islanders American Hockey League affiliate) where he had recorded two assists and ten penalty minutes. New York could have elected to have Wilde remain there because he was drafted by the Islanders before he joined the Spirit, but the decision was made to have Wilde, who just turned 20 to go back and play among junior-aged players.
Wilde had 70 points in 62 games with the Spirit in 2018-19 and helped them to reach the Western Conference finals in the playoffs.
Up next
The Knights will play a big game on Friday, Feb. 14 in which no love will be lost. The Kitchener Rangers arrive at Budweiser Gardens for the fifth meeting of the season between the teams. Everything has split right now the middle between the two clubs, with each team having beaten the other team at home and on the road. There have been lopsided victories and multi-point performances. Both Connor McMichael of the Knights and Jonathan Yantsis of Kitchener have put up four points in a single game.
The teams are separated by three points for first place in the Western Conference. Right now, London has two games in hand. They will play the final game of their regular season series in Kitchener on March 3.
Coverage for Friday’s game will get going at 6:30 on 980 CFPL, http://www.980cfpl.ca and on the Radioplayer Canada app.
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