The Oakville Blades had a busy three days. They played the Branford 99ers, the Markham Royals, and the Milton Menace. Here's a recap of each game.
Feb. 17, 2022. Oakville Blades @ Brantford 99ers
Oakville started its first of three straight games against the Brantford 99ers, who this season have always played the Blades tough and had won the last three games against Oakville.
Oakville looked to build off of an offensive outburst that was had in their last two games against both Aurora and Milton.
The Blades did just that as right off the start of the game Zach Wigle fed Cole Weinger for a partial breakaway that Weinger put in the back of the net to give the Blades a 1-0 lead just 2:53 into the game.
The third assist on that goal went to AP call-up Callum Arnott who on that play, registered his first-ever OJHL point.
Shortly after that goal, Mason Zibeski tipped home an Ethan Sullivan point shot to give the Blades a 2-0 lead.
Just over a minute after the Zibeski goal, Chris Gjoncaj sprung Chase Strychaluk on a partial break that he roofed over Brantford goaltender Justin Wu making Oakville’s lead 3-0.
Brantford got one goal back from a bad angle by Lucas Thompson bringing Brantford within two.
Then before the 10-minute mark, Adam Tucci took a great pass from Owen Wilson that sent him in on a breakaway that he capitalized on with a backhand goal bringing Oakville’s lead back to three goals and they took that 4-1 lead into the first intermission.
Unfortunately for Oakville, defenseman Cole Weinger blocked a shot off the hand and was removed from the game. No timetable has been given on his current medical status
Oakville kept up their great play in the second period and continued to pour on the pressure.
Callum Arnott extended Oakville’s lead with his first career OJHL goal off of a great pass by Chase Strychaluk giving Oakville a 5-1 lead.
Then Strychaluk struck again banging home a Yanni Kaidonis shot to make the score 6-1 Blades.
Brantford got one goal back on the powerplay at the start of the third with a shot by Easton Wainright to make the score 6-2 Blades and that is how close the 99ers would get.
Oakville wins their first away game of 2022 and played one of the most complete games of their season.
Head Coach Ross Sloan felt the win was due to the team's fast and early start saying, “I think it’s a lot easier when you start the game the right way. We started with some good pace and scored a couple of goals quickly and that gets the other team chasing us. The funny thing is, that has been us in past few games, where we are the ones giving up two early goals and then we start chasing the other team.”
Feb. 18, 2022. Oakville Blades @ Markham Royals
After a great performance in Brantford, the Blades travelled to Markham for a showdown against the Royals.
The game started with a very good pace, with chances going back and forth.
Markham was the first team to find the back of the net on a powerplay goal by Khaden Henry assisted by Matthew Perciballi and Shane Hyman to give the Royals a 1-0 lead.
The Blades later took another penalty but Brenden Bowie broke out on a two-on-one shorthanded break with Evan Pringle.
Bowie passed the puck to Pringle but it deflected off of a Markham player and in the net.
The goal is credited to Brenden Bowie with an assist to Evan Pringle but more importantly, it tied the game for the Blades at 1-1 and that’s how the first period would end.
In the second period, it was Oakville’s turn to get a powerplay.
On that powerplay, Ethan Sulivan sent a pass to Jacob Crisp on the boards and Crisp sent a beautiful pass to Bowie for a one-timer in the slot. Bowie made no mistake and scored his second of the game and gave Oakville the 2-1 lead.
The rest of the second period saw multiple scoring chances for Oakville, but Markham’s goalie Joseph Young stood tall in the net and kept the game at 2-1 for the rest of the second period.
The third period saw Markham tie the game with a quick shot by Nikolas Bannister assisted by William Haines and Shane Bondy making the score 2-2.
Markham took the lead with a goal by Matthew Minichiello off of a beautiful pass by Matthew Perciballi with a secondary assist going to Cole Cooksey to give the Royals a 3-2 lead.
The Blades tried to find the equalizer but came up short in the end and dropped this game 3-2 to the Royals in regulation.
After the game, Oakville defenseman Andrew Brown spoke on how the Blades needed to play in order to win saying, “We need to bury teams early. If we don’t bury teams early, they are just going to come back like how Markham just did, and it’s just very frustrating.”
Feb. 19, 2022. Milton Menace @ Oakville Blades
After an underwhelming performance in Markham, the Blades returned home for another competition against rival, Milton Menace.
Due to injuries, the Blades played with only nine forwards and because of that, it shortened Oakville’s bench to less than 20 players.
Oakville started the game off hot with a goal by Jake Alcaraz with assists going to Aiden Taylor and Ethan Sullivan to give the Blades the early 1-0 lead.
Shortly after, Josh Kudo scored with a backhander assisted by Chase Strychaluk and Andrew Brown to give Oakville a 2-0 lead.
Before the period ended Holden Rogers scored for the Menace with a shot from the slot assisted by Andrew Horsley and Ethan Sims to make the score 2-1 for the Blades as the first period concluded.
The Menace were granted an early powerplay in the second and capitalized on the man advantage.
Andrew Horsley received a beautiful pass from Lucas Buzziol on a two-on-one and he scored to tie the game 2-2.
Shortly after, Milton was given another powerplay that they scored on.
Ethan Sims was able to finish off a great pass from Jordan Stock and just squeezed the puck past Cole DeFazio to give Milton a 3-2 lead.
Both teams traded chances for the rest of the period but the second period ended with Milton up 3-2.
At the start of the third, former Blade James Barbour took a pass from Ethan Sims and roofed it over the shoulder of the Oakville goaltender knocking off his water bottle to give the Menace a 4-2 lead.
Later on in the period, the Blades were given a powerplay of their own and Chase Strychaluk would feed Evan Pringle a beautiful pass that Pringle sniped home to cut Milton’s lead to 4-3.
After that goal, Oakville got another powerplay but Milton capitalized on a sleeping Blades squad and Jordan Stock scored shorthanded to give Milton a 5-3 lead.
The seconds ticked off the clock and the Blades pulled their goalie for the extra attacker and were able to get one goal by Evan Pringle assisted by Josh Kudo and Chase Strychaluk but that was all the Blades could do as they drop this game 5-4.
After the game, Jake Alcaraz spoke on getting his first goal saying, “It was definitely a really great feeling; it was the first shift of the game and I was able to shoot the puck right above the pad and right below the blocker. I’m happy it went in.”
Alcaraz commented on what the Blades need to do in order to win the next game saying, “We need to clean up our special teams; we had a short lineup today because we had nine forwards but we had some mental lapses. We need to clean that up if we want to be competitive.”
Oakville’s next game is on Monday at 1 p.m. in Burlington for a classic BurlOak showdown against the Cougars.