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Sarnia Sting

Sting Top Whalers 5-2

January 17, 2015 - Ontario Hockey League (OHL)
Sarnia Sting News Release


For most Sarnia Sting fans, Friday night's 5-2 victory over the Plymouth Whalers will go down as just another two points in the standings.

But for head coach Trevor Letowski the win means so much more.

"I would have to say that was one of our gutsiest wins of the season. We lost both Pavel Zacha and Noah Bushnell with injuries in the second period and Davis Brown with misconduct. We were already short up front and I think I had only six or seven healthy forwards at that point.

"The game was far from over going into the third period even though we had a three-goal lead. The players came up with a great effort in the third period to keep them off the board. Later in the season when we think about important games, we can look back and think about this one."

The Sting came up with a much better overall effort than they did 24 hours earlier against Kitchener to improve to 22-15-3-2 on the season.

The win vaulted Sarnia into a fourth play tie with Guelph in the Western Conference of the Ontario Hockey League.

"Sure, we look at the standings, but there is still a lot of season left. I think it's 26 games to go. We know it's going to be a grind so we can't think about seedings or anything like that. But it is a good motivation tool."

Letowski said the team had a longer than usual pre-game meeting to go over their game plan.

"We talked about structure and how important it was to play a smart game. Plymouth is a desperate team and we knew it wasn't going to be easy. They are getting healthy and have a lot of skill up front."

One of the important factors in this game was the Sting taking a 3-1 lead after one period.

They opened the coring at 2:33 when Davis Brown knocked in a pass out from Stephen Pierog for his 14th goal of the season.

Jordan Kyrou increased the lead to 2-0 at 8:27 on the power play when he fired home a rebound for his eighth of the year.

After Plymouth cut the margin to 2-1 at 9:07 on a goal by Connor Chatham, Anthony Salinitri scored his first goal in a Sting uniform at 16:11 poking home a loose puck from close range.

Pierog assisted on all three Sting goals.

The Sting kept coming in period two and took a 5-1 lead with a pair of goals. Alex Renaud got the first at eight minutes when he made a nice deke to slip a backhand into the net for his sixth goal while Jakob Chychrun notched his ninth of the year at 14:03 on the power play.

Newcomer Josh Defarias assisted on Renaud's goal, his first OHL point.

Plymouth scored their second goal by Connor Sills at 18:23 of period, but that would be it. The Sting did a great job of defending in the third period.

Taylor Dupuis had another solid game between the pipes for Sarnia as he faced 31 shots. His team-mates peppered two Plymouth goalies with 45 shots, including 21 in the first period. Alex Nedeljkovic played the first period before giving way to Zack Bowman.

The win was tempered somewhat by the fact the injury bug continues to hit the team.

Goalie Justin Fazio was unable to dress due to an upper body injury. As mentioned earlier, the Sting lost forwards Bushnell and Zacha in the second period with upper body injuries.

The team was already without Jeff King, Troy Lajeunesse, Brandon Lindberg, Patrick White, Matt Ciccarelli and Nikita Korostelev. Lajeunesse was hurt in Thursday's game and expected to be out 2-3 weeks.

The Sting plays its third game in as many days Saturday night when they travel to London to battle the Knights. Sarnia will be in London again next Friday before returning home next Saturday to tangle with the Windsor Spitfires beginning at 7:05 p.m. at the RBC Centre.

Tickets for that game and all remaining home games for the Sting are on sale daily at the RBC Box Office, by calling 519-541-1717 or going online at Sarniasting.com.

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Ontario Hockey League Stories from January 17, 2015


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