Hughes paces Battalion production
BRAMPTON, Ont. – John Hughes topped the Brampton Battalion’s offence in 2007-08, scoring 28 goals and earning a team-leading 63 assists for 91 points in the full slate of 68 Ontario Hockey League games.
Hughes scored the final goal into an empty net with two seconds left to play Sunday, securing a 5-3 victory over the Kingston Frontenacs to complete a season in which the Battalion posted a won-lost-extended record of 42-22-4 for 88 points and won the Central Division championship.
Hughes, who fashioned a career-high 11-game points streak, also had six-game goals and eight-game assists streaks to lead the team. Hughes earned a career-best five assists in a 7-2 win Nov. 8 over the visiting Owen Sound Attack. The 91 points bettered his previous career high, set in 2005-06 with the Belleville Bulls, by nine, and the 28 goals matched his career best from that season.
Cody Hodgson, who finished second in offensive production with 85 points in 68 games, scored a team-leading 40 goals, becoming the third Battalion player to achieve that total in a season. Wojtek Wolski scored 47 in 2005-06, and Raffi Torres had 43 in 1999-00.
Hodgson, who scored two goals and added four assists for six points in a 9-5 win Nov. 23 at Kingston, tied a club record with eight game-winning goals. Ryan Oulahen and Tyler Harrison each had that number in 2004-05.
Bobby Sanguinetti, who established career bests with 29 goals, a club record for a defenceman, and 70 points in 61 games, finished second in scoring among OHL rearguards to the Sarnia Sting’s Ryan Wilson, who had seven goals and 64 assists for 71 points. While Sanguinetti shattered Rostislav Klesla’s mark of 18 goals by a defenceman, set in 2000-01, he fell short of Michael Vernace’s club-record 72 points by a blueliner in 2005-06.
Sanguinetti posted two five-point games, including a 7-1 home-ice win Nov. 11 over the Mississauga St. Michael’s Majors in which he scored a team season-high four goals, tying a club record held by Jeff Bateman, Jay McClement, Wolski and Luke Lynes.
An unprecedented seven players scored at least 20 goals for the Troops. Apart from Hughes, Hodgson and Sanguinetti, the others were Matt Duchene with 30, Thomas Stajan with 24, Lynes with 21 and Graham McNabb with 20. Cory Emmerton, acquired from Kingston on Dec. 5, had 25 goals in total, including 12 in 30 Battalion games.
The Battalion won seven consecutive games from Dec. 1-14, the second-longest winning streak in club history to a 14-game run that ended the 2005-06 season, and won a club-record eight home games in a row from Jan. 20 through March 2. The Troops lost two games in a row seven times but never suffered a third consecutive defeat.
The Battalion scored a season-high 10 goals Sept. 28 in a 10-2 thrashing of the visiting Sudbury Wolves and, in another season-best showing, netted five goals in the second period of an 8-5 victory Feb. 10 over the visiting London Knights.
The Troops twice were tagged with a season-high seven goals against, in a 7-3 loss Oct. 12 at Mississauga and in a 7-6 shootout loss Feb. 22 to the host Plymouth Whalers. The team surrendered four goals in a period four times.
The Battalion, 23-11-0 at home and 19-11-4 on the road, went 16-10-2 within the division and 13-7-0 against the East Division for a 29-17-2 mark within the Eastern Conference. The Troops were 7-2-1 facing Midwest Division teams and 6-3-1 against West Division foes for a 13-5-2 record against the Western Conference.
The Battalion went 29-7-2 in the 38 games in which it scored first and 13-16-1 in 30 games that saw the opposition strike first. The Troops were 34-1-2 when leading after two periods, 4-16-0 when trailing after two periods and 4-6-1 when tied after 40 minutes. The team won five of nine games that went past regulation time, winning one of two overtime decisions and four of seven shootouts. The Battalion was 10-11-4 in one-goal games.
The Troops’ power play ranked fourth in the league, with 86 goals from 394 opportunities for an effectiveness rate of 21.8 percent. Sanguinetti was the top man-advantage sniper with 17 goals. The Oshawa Generals led the OHL at 27.6 percent, followed by the Kitchener Rangers and Belleville.
Battalion penalty killing was No. 1 in the league at an effectiveness rate of 88.0 percent, giving up 40 goals in 332 shorthanded situations. The Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds were second at 87.3 percent.
The Battalion was the second-least-penalized team, drawing an average of 14.6 penalty minutes per game. Belleville was the most gentlemanly team at 13.5 minutes a game, while the Niagara IceDogs led the penalty parade with 21.5.
