Colts Fall to Frontenacs 5-2 on Family Day
A four goal third period by Kingston lead to a 5-2 victory for the Frontenacs over the Barrie Colts on Monday.
Family Day featured a rare Monday afternoon game as two of the top teams from the Eastern Conference faced off in Kingston.
The Barrie Colts and the Kingston Frontenacs were two of the hottest teams in the OHL coming into this contest. The home team came in winners of 8 of their last ten games, while the Colts came in on a four game winning streak along with 7 of their last 8 games.
Another big story for the Colts was that Barrie’s Import pick from this past year, Andrei Svechnikov was back in the lineup after missing the last three games due to the Five Nations Cup.
The game wouldn’t begin with any serious scoring chances but you could tell from the drop of the puck this game was going to be a physical one. Both teams came in wanting to make their presence felt with laying the body and the first half of the period showed it with multiple big hits from both sides.
The second period would give us our first goal of the game. It was the Colts’ top line of Aaron Luchuk, Dmitry Sokolov and Svechnikov that teamed up to get it. After a shot that went wide off the stick of Luchuk, it rang around the boards to Svechnikov who fed it into the slot for Sokolov before having him snap it home for his 39th of the season. The assist by Luchuk extended his point streak to 15 games, while Svechnikov pushes his to 12 straight games.
After the goal, Barrie was rewarded with a couple of powerplays, but weren’t able to get some insurance. A couple of penalty kills lead to some momentum for the home team.
It was a bouncing puck in the Barrie zone that fell right onto the stick of Gabriel Vilardi who then pulled the puck to his left to move around Leo Lazarev before sneaking it in behind him to tie the game at one.
The next goal in this game seemed like it was going to be a very important one, especially with how these two teams have been playing.
It would be the visitors who would get that second goal. Late in the third period it was a rush up the ice. Zach Magwood led it into the Kingston zone before sliding the puck over to Ryan Suzuki. He faked out a defender and move the puck to his right to set up Lucas Chiodo for the one-timer that he made no mistake on and put it past Jeremy Helvig to restore Barrie’s one goal lead. The goal was his 22nd of the season.
Into the third Barrie once again was looking for that insurance marker, but the Fronts would answer again. After the Colts were left looking around for the puck it would come across the crease right onto the stick of Linus Nyman who put it upstairs on Lazarev to once again tie the game.
The Fronts would keep the momentum on their side as the were given a powerplay and made Barrie pay. Midway through the man advantage Brett Neumann brought the Colts defender wide and then went across the ice for Ted Nichol who just had to put a stick on it to give them their first lead of the game.
It didn’t stop. Moments later it was Nyman adding his second of the game. Off a big rebound in front of the Barrie net he banged it home to give Kingston the 4-2 lead.
Vilardi would add an empty net for his second of the game to make it 5-2 and solidify the victory.
Kingston’s win also secured them a playoff birth.
The loss snaps Barrie’s four game winning streak. They are back in action this Thursday as they host the Mississauga Steelheads at 7:30pm.
