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| Saturday, March 13, 2010 |
67's rally, knock Generals out of playoffs
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By AEDAN HELMER, Ottawa Sun
The Oshawa Generals came into Urbandale Centre Friday night fighting for their lives, needing two points and a favour to keep their slim playoff hopes alive.
They got neither, as the Sudbury Wolves won in Kingston and the Generals blew a 3-1 third-period lead to lose 4-3 to the 67’s, officially eliminating the Generals from the playoff race.
“(Oshawa) competed hard and they definitely came after us," said 67’s coach Chris Byrne. “They had a couple of tough breaks against them, but they played their hearts out."
Cody Lindsay, with his second of the game, Tyler Cuma and Thomas Nesbitt scored in a six-minute span in the third.
“We were working hard early in the game, but they were working harder," said Nesbitt, who scored the winner with 5:45 left in the third.
“In the second intermission, the coaches weren’t happy with us and we weren’t happy with ourselves. It was a good show of character to come back in the third."
The dynamic duo of Lindsay and Tyler Toffoli have had their share of fun against the Generals this season, leading the 67’s to a 5-0-1 record against their division rivals.
Toffoli led all players in the season series with 15 points (four goals) in six games, while linemate Lindsay had 14 points, including nine goals.
“It’s just one of those teams where everything you shoot seems to go in, or every time you pass, it seems to end up in a chance," said Lindsay, the game’s first star after netting his 38th and 39th goals of the season.
Lindsay opened the scoring just 1:24 into the game.
Dalton Smith used his big presence to knock the puck loose in his own end, chipping the puck up the boards to Lindsay, who broke in with Toffoli on a 2-on-1.
Lindsay kept the puck, waited for defenceman Alex Dzielski to commit, then blasted a shot through Michael Zador’s five-hole.
The Generals evened it up with four minutes left in the first when Christian Thomas made a series of nifty moves to stickhandle around Cuma, then skated in untouched around the net and banked a shot in off the skate of Ottawa defenceman Marc Zanetti.
Thomas made it 2-1 in the second period with his team-leading 41st of the season by one-timing an Andy Andreoff pass by Mrazek.
Oshawa staked a 3-1 lead at 10:47 of the second after Zanetti lost a puck battle with Alain Berger, then watched helplessly as the stick was knocked from his hands and Berger had a clear lane to fire a puck past Mrazek for his 19th goal of the season.
The 67’s carried the play through the opening minutes of the third, and were rewarded when a Zanetti point shot found its way onto Lindsay’s stick, who buried it at 8:49 to make it 3-2.
Less than two minutes later, Cuma wired it off the post and into the gaping cage.
With all the momentum on their side, the 67’s pressed for the winner, and got it off the stick of Nesbitt, who was denied on two surefire chances, but finallly buried his 32nd goal of the season in a furious goal-mouth scrum.
Ottawa hosts Sudbury in the regular-season finale Sunday afternoon (2 p.m.), a game that will determine whether the second-seeded 67’s will play the Wolves or Niagara IceDogs in the first round.
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