Veteran winger conveys club’s frustration
by Peter Ruicci (Independent Media) | Photo by Natalie Shaver
PHOTO GALLERY | GAME HIGHLIGHTS
Never one to sugarcoat uncomfortable realities, Marco Mignosa summed up the Soo Greyhounds league-worst powerplay on Saturday in a few simple words.
“It’s a complete disaster,” said the overage winger, whose team failed to convert on six man-advantage opportunities, while losing 3-2 to the Flint Firebirds before 3,612 at Dort Financial Center. “One-hundred per cent it cost us a game tonight. It was terrible.”
“It’s very frustrating,” added head coach John Dean, who watched the OHL’s hottest team maintain status quo with its 11th consecutive victory.
Flint improved to 19-6-1-0.
“The powerplay could have won us a game tonight,” added Dean, who thought his club outplayed the home side 5-on-5. “It should have and could have.”
Not only did the visitors fail to generate scoring chances on the powerplay Saturday, they struggled badly when it came to entering the Flint zone with possession.
“Those are legitimate red flags,” said Dean, whose club has enjoyed the second-most power-play opportunities of the OHL’s 20 teams this season.
However, the Soo has converted a mere 17 times in 27 games. That’s out of 121 chances. The Greyhounds success rate is a shrinking, 14.0 per cent.
And over their last nine games they’re just 4-for-36.
“We feel we’ve left some wins on the table, no doubt,” added Dean, whose team outshot Flint 30-17, yet fell to 15-10-1-1 on the season heading into a Friday home game against Oshawa (7:07 p.m.). “But by the looks on guys faces, this might be a blessing in disguise.”
The coach explained how his players are angry with themselves.
“Any time you hit rock bottom, it’s an opportunity for a legitimate reset and that’s what we’ll do.”
“All we can do is go back to the drawing board and simplify things,” said Mignosa. “We’ll talk to our coaches, talk to the guys on the power play and try to get some solves (answers).”
Asked about the talent the Hounds typically employ on their power-play units, the overage spoke of how the results should be much better.
“One-hundred per cent, our talent is better than what we’re showing on the powerplay,” added Mignosa, whose team, while trailing 3-2, had three power-play chances to tie the game over the final 30 minutes. “We blame ourselves.”
Saturday’s performance marked the “most frustrated we’ve been on the powerplay this season,” added defenceman Chase Reid, who spoke of the need to make power-play reps better at practice. “We need to make sure we’re crisp. We need to clean up our entries and come together as a group.”
After Flint won a battle behind the Soo net, Darels Uljanskis took a shot from the top of the right circle which appeared to hit a Greyhound player’s skate. The puck got through the legs of Landon Miller to open the scoring 8:53 in.
Four minutes later, former Greyhound Alex Kostov converted on the power play. His shot from the slot appeared to get under Miller’s arm on the glove side to make it 2-0.
Dean spoke of how an early two-goal hole “against a team like that is difficult to climb out of.”
Quinn McKenzie’s hard work down low led to the first Soo tally. McKenzie fed Travis Hayes who found Mignosa all alone on the left side of the goal. Mason Vaccari had no chance and Mignosa’s 13th made it 2-1 at 15:09.
But early in the second, Reid’s turnover at the Soo blue-line allowed Jimmy Lombardi to give his club a 3-1 lead. Lombardi banged home the rebound of a Nathan Aspinall scoring chance.
At 6:15 of the second, on a delayed penalty, Tobias Zvolensky fired and scored through traffic from the right circle to make it 3-2.
But the visitors could get no closer.
“We’re happy. Today wasn’t our best, but we found a way,” said Flint head coach Paul Flache, whose club began its 11-game streak with an identical 3-2 win at GFL Memorial Gardens on Nov. 5.
On the Flint television broadcast, the coach spoke of how his team “had great goaltending and great penalty-killing. We eked one out.”
Notes:
Listed day-to-day, Hounds captain Brady Martin missed his third straight game with an upper-body injury.
Brodie McConnell-Barker also sat out with a lower-body injury.
