Photos: Hélène Rancourt
BLIND RIVER, Ont. – The Soo Eagles notched four first period goals, then withstood a late push from the the Blind River Beavers, before eventually prevailing 8-6 Sunday in a goal-filled Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League matinee at the Blind River Community Centre.
Visiting Sault Ste. Marie opened the scoring midway through the first period when they broke out quickly after face-off deep in their own zone and saw Coulson Bell jam in a loose puck off a rebound put in close from Logan Stawizynski.
The Eagles then went up by a pair at 16:38 when a harmless looking shot deep in the left circle by Colton Huckson leaked through Beavers’ netminder Mason Janicki and slid in.
With that, Blind River chose to make a goaltending change as back-up Justin Sullivan entered in long relief.
However, the Soo came right back and got another with Anden Marceau taking a draw back to him, then moved to the middle and snapped it in.
An open Stawizynski in front then capped off the offensive outburst as he supplied his club’s fourth of the period by converting from the top of the crease at 19:58.
With Janicki back in net to begin the second stanza, the Beavers got one back at 8:13 as defenceman Austin Schultz moved in from the point and fired an attempt from between the circles that Soo goalkeeper Jace Knoerle handled, but the rebound pinballed off the skate of a defender and bounced into the net.
Quick to counter, Brendan Boberg got that back for the Eagles just over a minute later as he neatly tipped in a Liam Watson blast from just inside the blueline.
In the third, a Lucas Caulfield marker 24 seconds in saw him lift in a chance off a Nolan Nemecek attempt before Micah Seery connected a couple of shifts later as he came in the back door and ripped a feed put his way upstairs on Janicki.
Blind River did get a couple back off the stick of Ilian Danilov as he clicked at even strength, and on a two-man advantage, as he ripped in a one-timer off an Ellyott Dundas pass and heaved in his second after being teed up by Camden Cowan.
Building on that, they banged in two more to pull closer.
After Geoffrey Boates scored at 13:55 by going to the net and stuffing in a down-low Leighton Hurst feed, Hurst then connected moments later to make it 7-5 as he ripped a shot past Knoerle from the top of the right circle.
The Soo got some insurance with a long-range Seery empty netter from deep in his own end before Wyatt Jarratt completed the high-scoring affair on the power play for the Beavers in the final minute.
With the win, the Eagles, who are 7-0-1-0 in their past eight outings, improved to 17-19-2-1 while the loss sees the Beavers sink to 12-22-0-4.
