Rangers Edge 67’s In Shootout
The month of November can make or break a hockey team and the Ottawa 67’s are once again in danger of having the 11th month dictate the direction their season — and not in a good way.
It was only 12 months ago that the 67’s went 3-11 in November to drop from legitimate playoff contender to the very bottom of the league.
Fresh off a stunning shootout loss Sunday to a youthful Kitchener Rangers team that arrived in Ottawa ranked 20th in the Ontario Hockey League after winning just four of 18 games, could history be repeating itself for the 67’s?
The Rangers fired 51 shots at Philippe Trudeau and overcame an early 2-0 deficit, then left the 67’s soul-searching after shootout goals by Darby Llewellyn and Justin Bailey sent them to a third consecutive loss, this one with a Sunday afternoon crowd of 5,367 on hand at the Canadian Tire Centre.
The 67’s needed a bounce back game after back-to-back dreadful efforts and the timing of a visit by the Rangers was just what they needed ahead of a visit from the London Knights Thursday.
Instead, on team photo day the 67’s were far from picture perfect
“Right now, we are not doing what we have to do and this loss is a lot more disappointing,” said four-year veteran Taylor Fielding. “The veterans don’t want a repeat of last year and we just can’t have these lapses. We are not playing 60 minutes.”
The 67’s don’t get a lot of offence from their defence, so it was something to really celebrate when Finnish import Alex Lintuniemi let go with a blast from the point that eluded Rangers goalie Matthew Greenfield at 9:10 for his first goal on North American ice.
Four minutes later, Brett Gustavsen took a nifty feed from the fast-improving Tyler Hill and roofed it past Greenfield.
Travis Konecny assisted on both to regain the league lead in rookie scoring with 19 points in as many games.
But the Rangers came to life in the second with unanswered goals by Nick Magyar, Justin Bailey and Brent Pederson around three ineffective 67’s power plays in the period.
Only a goal by Konecny with 57.4 seconds left sent it to overtime and got the 67’s a point.
“We can’t get down on ourselves,” said Konecny. “We have to keep pushing.”
Written by Don Campbell
Photo by Chris Mikula
