Juvenile Express Win Game 4 Thriller to Win Series, News, Juvenile Rep - Carmeuse Lime, U21 ( Juvenile ), 2019-2020 (Ingersoll & District Minor Hockey)

This Team is part of the 2019-2020 season, which is not set as the current season.
News Article
News Article Image
Mar 08, 2020 | GCalder | 2309 views
Juvenile Express Win Game 4 Thriller to Win Series
The Ingersoll Carmeuse Lime Express Juvenile won a game 4 thriller in Elmira on Sunday afternoon to beat the Woolwich Wildcats 3-2 by scoring 2 goals in the last two minutes to win the series 6-2 in points and advance to the OMHA/OHF Juvenile Tier 1 championships.  To say this game was a thriller, especially the finish, is certainly an understatement. 

Going into the game with Woolwich facing elimination, the Express knew they were in for a tough game as Woolwich would not go down without a hard fought battle.  The first period would not start out favourably for Ingersoll as the Wildcats would score the game’s first goal with 7:14 left in the first period.  Woolwich would score a late first period powerplay goal to take a 2-0 lead after 1 period.

The second period would see Ingersoll pull to with one goal as Derek Johnston and Eric Savoie would set up Maxx Shelton who scored with 2:06 remaining in the period to make the score 2-1.

As the third period wore on, it appeared that the series was heading towards a game 5 as neither time could find the back of the net due some strong goaltending at both ends of the ice and some solid defensive zone coverage.  Then with 2:07 left in the third period, Woolwich would take a tripping penalty giving Ingersoll a glimmer of hope.  With the faceoff in the Woolwich zone, Carter Franklin would win the draw to Eric Savoie who would pass the puck to Tanner Gray at the blue line.  Tanner would fake a shot before passing to Kyle Rachar, who’s shot from the left faceoff circle would rebound off the Woolwich goalie right to Eric Savoie who would rip a slap shot from the right faceoff dot past the Wildcats goalie to tie the game at 2-2 with 1:53 left in the third.  This goal gave the Express a lot of life as it appeared the game was likely headed for overtime.  However after Woolwich won a late faceoff in the Wildcats zone, Clayton Hammond would win a battle for the puck along the boards at the Woolwich blue line to keep the puck in the Woolwich zone where Parker Hodgson would pick up a loose puck and fire a wrist shot that was steered to the corner behind the net.  As Woolwich tried to clear puck by with pass behind their net, Parker Hodgson would intercept the pass and pass the puck in front of the Wildcats net where after a frantic scramble, a loose puck would finds its way to Austin Wallace who would put the puck in the back of the net with only 7.9 seconds remaining in the third period for the game winning and series clinching goal.  This capped an extremely exciting last two minutes of the game, one that will be remembered for a long time for those that played or saw the game.

Head coach Ken Zegers is very proud of this group of players as indicated in his comments.  Zegers stated “very proud of the boys for what they were able to accomplish.  Great team effort as all 4 lines contributed to the wins.  Our Midget AP call ups did a solid job and certainly fit right in.  Strong team defense kept Woolwich from generating much in our own end.  Looking forward to Kingsville.  The boys have hit their stride at the right time of year”.

This Express juvenile team is certainly peaking at the right time of year.  After some ups and downs during the regular season, the team has recorded 6 wins and only 1 loss in its two playdown series against Hespeler and a very good Woolwich team.  They have gotten exceptional efforts from everyone on the roster.  Ken Zegers and his coaching staff deserve a lot of credit for the way they  have the team well prepared to compete in each and every game.

As previously stated the Express will advance to the OMHA/OHF Juvenile Tier 1 championships from March 27-29 in Kingsville.  This is quite the accomplishment given that Ingersoll is competing against AAA,AA and A centres in the playdown grouping this year.  Job well done and best of luck in Kingsville.

The Juvenile team would like to congratulate the Express Peewee Rep team and the Peewee AE teams for their OMHA playdown runs that ended in the semifinals in two tightly contested series.

Next action for the Juvenile Express will be Thursday night when they travel to Beverly to face the Bandits in a Beechey Juvenile league playoff game.  The Bandits will pay a return visit to Ingersoll next Saturday night (March 14th) at 8:30.