OHL North Bay Battalion

Windsor Prevails 5-4 After Furious Finish

December 6, 2014 - Ontario Hockey League (OHL)
North Bay Battalion News Release


WINDSOR, Ont. - Aaron Luchuk scored three goals to lead the Windsor Spitfires to a 5-4 victory over the North Bay Battalion in an Ontario Hockey League game Saturday night that featured a wild finish.

Logan Brown and Jamie Lewis scored the other Windsor goals, with a shorthanded, empty-net score by Lewis, a former member of the Battalion, proving to be the winner before a crowd of 5,131.

Goaltender Alex Fotinos made 37 saves, including several in the final seconds, as Windsor moved its won-lost-extended record to 10-16-1 for 21 points, fifth in the West Division and 10th in the Western Conference.

Mike Amadio had one goal and two assists and Miles Liberati and Ray Huether one goal and one assist apiece for North Bay, which got its first goal from Kyle Wood. Goaltender Evan Cormier, making his sixth start, faced 19 shots.

The Battalion, which lost 5-2 to the Sarnia Sting on Friday night in the opener of a three-game road trip, is 14-7-5 for 33 points, first in the Central Division.

Penalty killer Lewis, facing his onetime teammates for the first time since a trade Sept. 29, the same day the Troops acquired fellow overager Huether from the Sudbury Wolves, gave Windsor a 5-3 lead at 18:41 of the third period, propelling the puck down the ice into the empty net while sprawling in his own zone.

With Cormier still off for an extra attacker, Amadio scored at 19:17, redirecting Huether's feed from deep on the right wing, but the Troops failed to find the equalizer despite storming the Windsor zone until the final buzzer.

After trailing 3-2 through 40 minutes, North Bay tied it on the power play at 12:54 of the third period as Huether tipped home a screened blast by Brenden Miller.

Luchuk scored his sixth goal of the season at 14:41, converting the rebound of a Slater Doggett shot off a two-on-one rush, before Cormier first left the net with 1:50 left to play and Lewis collected the eventual winner on another Doggett assist.

After the teams tied 1-1 through 20 minutes, Brown scored on the power play at 7:45 of the middle period. Cormier mishandled a Trevor Murphy shot, and Brown swept the puck home for his sixth goal.

Luchuk scored a bizarre goal at 14:21, centring the puck from deep in the left corner and having it deflect into the net from a virtually impossible angle.

Liberati pulled North Bay within a goal during a two-man advantage at 16:49. Defenceman Liberati threaded the puck through a maze of bodies from the top of the right circle, assisted by Marcus McIvor and Mike Baird, himself just out of the penalty box.

Luchuk struck first at 13:37 of the first period, darting to the goalmouth to redirect a pass from the right side by Luke Kirwan after Markus Soberg won the disc on the end boards. The goal precipitated a barrage of teddy bears from the stands, but cleanup was completed in a mere three minutes.

Wood replied at 19:50 with two seconds left in a power play. Amadio fed the puck back to Wood at the blue line from deep in the right circle, and he sent it up the slot through traffic past Fotinos. Nick Paul had the other assist on defenceman Wood's eighth goal.

The Battalion visits the London Knights at 4 p.m. Sunday. The game can be seen live in North Bay on TVCogeco Cable 12 and heard on Country 600 CKAT.

BATTALION BULLETS: The crowd was the largest to see the Battalion play this season, eclipsing the 4,797 for a 4-1 road victory Nov. 7 over the Kingston Frontenacs ... The standings board in the media and scouts' hospitality room at the WFCU Centre still lists the Battalion as "Brampton" ... Amadio is on a career-high five-game goals streak, during which he has five goals and five assists for 10 points ... Paul has a five-game points streak, with two goals and five assists for seven points in the run ... McIvor has five assists in a four-game streak ... North Bay went 3-for-6 against the OHL's 20th-ranked penalty killing. Windsor was 1-for-3 on the power play ... Zach Shankar, normally a defenceman, centred Owen Green and Zach Poirier on the Troops' fourth line ... The Battalion was without David Sherman, Zach Bratina and Calvin Gomes ... Defenceman Murphy leads Windsor in scoring with eight goals and 17 assists for 25 points in 27 games ... The Troops got three OHL Priority Selection picks, a seventh-rounder in 2016, a fourth-rounder in 2017 and a 12th-rounder in 2019, for Lewis. He has scored four goals and earned seven assists for 11 points in 17 games with Windsor and is on a six-game points streak during which he has two goals and five assists for seven points ... The Spitfires don't play again before they visit North Bay at 7 p.m. Thursday ... The referees were Jason Goldenberg and Ryan Hutchison.

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