Day shines, Dean critical of Soo’s performance
by Peter Ruicci (Independent Media) | Photo by Bob Davies
Hot goalies continue to burn the Soo Greyhounds.
The Hounds were dominant in many ways, for lengthy periods of time on Wednesday.
But Nathan Day was brilliant in net, and the Flint Firebirds scored five unanswered goals – two into an empty net.
The result was a frustrating 6-3 loss for the Greyhounds before 3,101 at GFL Memorial Gardens.
“We clearly don’t know how to win yet,” lamented head coach John Dean, whose club fell to 7-5-0-0 heading into road games in Saginaw on Friday (7:05 p.m.) and Flint on Saturday (7 p.m.). “We should have put that game out of reach. I’m super disappointed, super disappointed.”
Over their first 12 games, the Hounds have been victimized by rival netminders Day, Carter George of Owen Sound and Ottawa’s Collin MacKenzie – twice.
“He played great,” Dean said of Day, whose club improved to 4-6-0-0. “But we can’t keep talking about hot goalies. At some point we have to take ownership over that and be harder on our opportunities.”
“It’s very tough, very frustrating,” Hounds winger Connor Clattenburg said of the Soo’s inability to convert. “We have to bear down and find a way to pop some in.”
On a night when the Soo held a 39-26 edge in shots, including 15-3 in the first period, centre Owen Allard had three breakaways and four high-quality chances overall. But each time, Day turned him aside.
“You get three or four good chances like that and you have to capitalize on one or two,” said Allard, who used his speed and determination to create opportunities. “When the goalie comes out at me, I have to deke him more. I just have to find a way to put it in the net.”
As much as the missed chances bothered Dean, the coach was irate over the way his players allowed frustration to seep into their game.
An inability to solve Day led the Hounds to stray from a team-first approach.
“We play 35 minutes of great hockey and for whatever reason we couldn’t find the twine,” he began. “We don’t score goals and our guys started cheating. Heaven forbid, we’re not up 8-0. Guys get frustrated when we don’t score and they get greedy.”
The coach went on to say a team needs to believe in what it’s doing over 60 minutes in order to find success.
The home side led 3-2 after 40 minutes while outshooting the Firebirds 28-11. And while the Soo had numerous Grade A scoring chances, the visitors had few.
“We needed to stick to the system and trust it for a full 60 minutes,” said winger Julian Fantino. “We can’t cheat for offence. We have to stay on the right side of the puck.”
“We have to stick to the fundamentals. Some of us were going off script,” Allard added.
Flint tied the game 3-3 early in the final frame. Coulson Pitre won a face-off and Zach Giroux ripped a shot past Landon Miller, high to the glove-hand side.
That goal, at 1:03, gave the Firebirds life. It apparently gave Dean heartburn.
“We made a major mistake to start the third period on a pre-scouted face-off. They tie it up and you give a team life,” Dean said. “Totally unacceptable.”
The coach went on to say the first three Flint goals were the result of “absolutely horrible mistakes.”
Wawa product Rylan Fellinger made a beautiful cross-ice feed to Nathan Aspinall, who beat Landon Miller to make it 4-3 at the 13:02 mark.
With the Hounds pushing, Day stopped an Arttu Karki shot and robbed Marco Mignosa on a rebound attempt with 1:30 left in regulation.
“He’s been outstanding,” head coach Paul Flache said of Day. “He looked calm tonight, he looked big, he swallowed rebounds.”
Tristan Bertucci and Braeden Kressler added empty-net markers in the final minute.
Giroux finished with two goals while Bertucci and Kressler each had a goal and an assist. Jeremy Martin had the other Flint marker.
Justin Cloutier had a goal and an assist and was the Soo’s best player. Clattenburg and Brenden Sirizzotti had the other goals. Andrew Gibson contributed two assists.