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Oakville loses two games but cling to final playoff spot

Lukas Bernasiewicz
Lukas Bernasiewicz

From March 17 to 20, the Oakville Blades lost to the Stouffville Spirit and the Burlington Cougars but are still in the final playoff spot in the Ontario Junior Hockey League's West Division.

Mar. 17, 2022. Oakville Blades @ Stouffville Spirit

After two significant losses to the Georgetown Raiders, the Blades looked to get back in the win collum against the Stouffville Spirit.

The Spirit is another team fighting for a playoff spot in their division, so this game was bound to be a doozie.

The Blades had many players return to the lineup. Adam Tucci returned from an arm injury. Josh Vagenas healed from a foot injury, Lucas Smith recuperated from a dislocated shoulder, and Jacob Crisp miraculously returned after being on crutches just four days ago.

The Blades got the scoring started early with a rebound goal by Josh Kudo from his linemates Evan Pringle and Chase Strychaluk to give the Blades a 1-0 lead.

With under three minutes left to go in the game, Stouffville Spirit tied it after Peter Kioussis finished off a rebound after a couple of attempts. Stouffville pulled even with the Blades.

Then with 12.8 seconds left in the period, the Blades won a critical defensive zone faceoff. Oakville’s defender tried to dump the puck down the ice, but the puck hit a Stouffville Spirit stick near the faceoff dot. Stouffville’s Ryan Cutler fed Peter Kioussis with a great pass, and Kioussis made no mistake and scored his second goal of the game. It was an absolute heartbreaker for the Blades as they entered the first intermission down a goal.

In the second period, the Blades got a 3 on 2 rush with Pringle, Kudo and Strychaluk. The trio executed a great passing play that ended with a hard-fought rebound goal by Evan Pringle, tying the game at 2-2.

Shortly after that goal, Stouffville took the lead back after a shot by Salvatore Bertucci squeaked by Cole DeFazio and was eventually finished off by Peter Kioussis. It gave him a hattrick and the Stouffville the 3-2 lead heading into the second intermission.

The third period was controversial.

Stouffville scored their fourth goal of the game just after the 10-minute mark. 

But before the goal, Stouffville's Odaro Ewere bumped into Cole DeFazio. The bump was enough for DeFazio to lose balance and fall to the ice. 

No penalty was called on the play. 

As DeFazio was trying to get back to his feet, Ewere found the loose puck and put it in before DeFazio was ready to face the shot. 

The Blades bench was extremely upset by the non-call. 

With no video review, the refs could not look back and see if there was goaltender interference, so the goal counted. The Spirit was up 4-2.

Three minutes later, the Blades were awarded a powerplay and a chance to get back into the game.

17 seconds into the powerplay, Zach Wigle found Adam Tucci wide open on the left-wing boards. Tucci made no mistake cutting the Stouffville lead to 4-3.

The Blades now needed to fight, tooth and nail for another goal to tie the game.

With the goalie pulled and the clock ticking down, the Blades kept firing every puck on the net, hoping to score.

The final 10 seconds of the game were absolute mayhem. The Blades created a scramble in front of Stouffville’s net and kept trying to tap home a loose puck.

The clock kept ticking down. Oakville celebrated with less than a second left as they had just scored the game-tying goal.

But the officials declared that the clock had run out of time and awarded Stouffville the 4-3 victory.

It was an incredibly crushing loss for Oakville; they were so close to pulling off an improbable comeback and at least getting one point.

The news got worse as Brantford won 5-1 against Georgetown, bringing them just one point behind the Blades for the last playoff spot in the West.

Lukas Bernasiewicz
Lukas Bernasiewicz

March 19, 2022. Burlington Cougars @ Oakville Blades

Oakville looked to avenge that loss against their traditional rivals in the Burlington Cougars; however, that would be a tall task as the Cougars have had the Blades number since the league resumed in early February.

The last time these two clubs met was March 5, when Burlington handed Oakville a 7-2 loss in front of the Oakville crowd.

The game started with a good chance from Oakville, but Burlington started to dictate play early on.

After many chances, the Cougars got the first goal of the game with a fantastic backhand goal by Burlington captain David Paluch in the top right corner of the net to give Burlington the 1-0 lead.

Shortly after that goal, Josh Belgrave tipped home a great pass from Bailey Kirwin to give Burlington the 2-0 lead heading into the first intermission.

Before the period ended, Burlington took a penalty giving the Blades a chance to get back in the game after the second period started.

Zach Wigle took a pass from Jacob Crisp on the Blades powerplay and wired the puck top corner knocking off the Burlington goaltender's water bottle to cut Burlington’s lead to 2-1.

Shortly after that goal went in, Burlington took the lead back after Matt Franzoi took advantage of a loose puck at the side of the net and tucked it in the net to give Burlington a 3-1 lead.

Near the end of the period, the Cougars scored again with a goal from the point by Sterling Wolters that Blades goaltender Tristan Malboeuf would definitely want back.

After the fourth goal, Malboeuf was replaced by Cole DeFazio, and the Cougars took that 4-1 lead into the second intermission.

The Blades got back in the game after a pass from Callum Arnot deflected right onto the stick of Chase Strychaluk. Chase made no mistake cutting the lead to 4-2.

Less than 30 seconds later, Josh Vagenas put on a shot from the point that landed right on the stick of Callum Arnot. Arnot potted the rebound bringing the score to 4-3 Cougars with just under 14 minutes left in the game.

The Blades were awarded two powerplays shortly after but could not convert. 

The team kept getting chances to tie the game but just couldn’t find the back of the net.

The comeback was ended when Thomas Lenart scored for the Cougars to make the game 5-3. The clock ticked down to zero, and the Blades dropped this game 5-3.

After the game, Chase Strychaluk commented on what the Blades can learn from this game, saying, “I think we battled back from adversity pretty well, and that’s a positive. We have a couple of games to get into the playoffs, and I think this is actually a step in the right direction, even though the outcome wasn’t what we wanted. We didn’t give up, and that was good.”

With Oakville’s next game also against Burlington, Chase commented on what Oakville needs to do to win on Tuesday, saying, “I think we need to lay the body a little more, get shots through, and we have to capitalize on our powerplay.”

Oakville still holds a slim one-point advantage over the Brantford 99ers for the last playoff spot in the West division.

Oakville's game against the Burlington Cougars is on Tuesday, March 22 at the Sixteen Mile Sports Complex. The puck drops at 7:00 PM. 


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