Sting back in win column
By DAVE BORODY
BELLEVILLE The Sarnia Sting returned to the win column Saturday night with a solid 4-2 win over the Belleville Bulls in Ontario Hockey League play in front of 2,338 fans at the Yardman Arena.
The win improved Sarnia’s record to 9-6-1-0 on the season as they have now won eight of their last 10 games.
Coming off one of their worst efforts of the season 24 hours earlier against Saginaw, the Sting controlled the game with the Bulls from start to finish taking a 1-0 lead after one period and carrying a 3-0 advantage after 40 minutes.
Ben O’Quinn led the Sting with two goals, giving him seven on the season, tops on the club. Jordan Hill and Jesse Stoughton scored the other Sting goals. Steve Reese had a pair of assists.
We did what we had to do, said Sting head coach Dave MacQueen. I didn’t think it was a great game. Maybe the big ice surface had something to do with that. I thought for 10-12 minutes in the second period we were very good.
MacQueen said it was important to bounce back after the loss to Saginaw.
Two points is two points and we’ll take them any way we can get them. You always want to see your team respond after a loss.
MacQueen said he liked what he saw from O’Quinn, who was been quiet in recent games.
He protects the puck so well in the offensive zone. He has that knack of coming off the side wall and getting a good scoring chance. Ben has that old-fashioned wrist shot that finds the back of the net. Ben also got us off to the lead tonight and that was important.
Despite being outshoot 10-5 in the opening period, Sarnia scored the only goal. It came off the stick of O’Quinn at the 9:29 mark.
O’Quinn used one of the Bulls defenceman as a screen and whistled a quick wrist shot over the glove hand of goalie Philipp Grubauer.
The Sting increased their lead to 2-0 two minutes into the second period. Captain Jordan Hill came out of the penalty box, intercepted a pass at the Bulls blueline, skated in alone and slipped a backhand between the legs of the goalie. It was Hill’s third goal of the season.
Sarnia’s power play, which went zero-for-nine against Saginaw, clicked on their first opportunity three minutes later. O’Quinn took a pass from Steve Reese in the slot and ripped a shot over the shoulder of the goalie. The shot was hard enough to knock the water bottle off the net.
The goal chased Grubauer from the Bulls net in favour of Tyson Teichmann after Grubauer allowed three goals on 14 shots.
The Bulls had some good scoring chances in the final 10 minutes of period two, but were unable to get the puck past Shayne Campbell. The Sting netminder had a little luck on his side as several times the puck was bouncing loose in the goal crease, but Belleville was unable to connect.
Jesse Stoughton’s third goal of the season staked the Sting to a 4-0 lead seven minutes into period three when he took a centering pass from Brandon Francisco and drilled a low slapshot past the Bulls netminder.
Campbell lost his shutout bid spoiled with just less than five minutes later when Braeden Corbeth poked home a loose puck for his first career OHL goal. Julien Lucianni scored Belleville’s second goal with just over a minute remaining.
Belleville finished with a 34-30 edge in shots on goal. MacQueen
said Campbell had a strong game in the Sting goal.
It was good to get Shayne back in goal after missing last weekend with the flu. I thought he made some real solid saves for us. In my opinion he was our first star.
Sarnia was one-for-two on the power play while Belleville was zero-for-five.
The Sting concludes a busy weekend Sunday afternoon when they travel to Kitchener to take on the Rangers beginning at 2 p.m. Sarnia’s next home game is Thursday when they host the Saginaw Spirit at 7:35 p.m. at the RBC Centre, On Friday Sarnia plays at Plymouth while the Ottawa 67s make their one and only appearance in Sarnia next Sunday at 2 p.m.
STING NOTES
– OQuinn was first star with Reese second star and Corbeth third star.
-The Sting took the season series with Belleville as they won 9-4 at the RBC Centre earlier this year.
– Scratches for the Sting last night included Brent Sullivan and J.C. Campagna, both sick, Ted Brithen (numbers) and goalie Adam Courchaine (fourth OA). Jesse Raymond was up from the Sarnia Legionnaires as Campbell’s backup in goal.
– Sarnia has slipped in special teams stats. The Sting is ninth on the power play and 15th on the penalty kill.
– Going into the game Sarnia was just 1-3-1-0 over the past five years here in Belleville.
-Taking part in the ceremonial opening face-off was former Detroit Red Wings star Darren McCarty. McCarty played his OHL career with the Bulls and was the Canadian Hockey League player of the year during the 1990-91 season when he scored 55 goals and 127 points. McCarty won four Stanley Cups with the Red Wings.
Dave Borody is a freelance writer who covers Sting games both home and away for the Sting website. Borody has seen more Sting games than anyone since they joined the OHL in 1994.
