Kale Osipenko Shines In OHL Debut As Sarnia Beats Kingston 3-1
By Carl Chimenti
Kale Osipenko stood tall in his first start in the Ontario Hockey League, stopping all but one of the 15 shots he faced, and the Sarnia Sting (13-23-4-1) capped a perfect weekend, beating the Kingston Frontenacs (18-20-2-2) 3-1 Sunday afternoon, in front of a loud crowd of 3,619, at the Progressive Auto Sales Arena.
The Renfrew, Ontario native who was selected by the Sting in the seventh round (126th overall) of the 2024 OHL Priority Draft gave up an early goal at 1:26 of the first period and then settled down, stopping the rest of the seven shots he faced. He followed that up by turning away all four shots in the second period and three more in the third to register his first career OHL win. For his effort Osipenko was named the third star.
Ben Pickell (10th) scored the first Sarnia goal against his former teammates and was named the first star of the game. In the last two games Pickell has been on a heater with two goals and two assists. The Sting scored one goal in each period, which included an empty net goal at 18:44 from Easton Walos, his team leading 16th goal, with Hughston Hurt and Beckham Edwards assisting, putting the game on ice.
The goal extended Walos’ goal streak to five straight games and his point streak to six games (5-3-8). In fact Walos has been red hot with points in 10 of his last 11 games (7-5-12).
Speaking of hot, Jack Van Volsen scored what proved to be the winning goal in the second period, his fourth in the last two games, which included his first career OHL hat-trick and the first three goal game by a Sting player this season, in his previous game against the Erie Otters. The Brooklin, Ontario native has points in his last three games (4-1-5). Van Volsen is second on the team with 15 goals.
Beckham Edwards had a pair of assists and has points in five of his last six games (2-4-6). Jordan Bax, Brenner Lammens, Liam Beamish and Hughston Hurt had single assists. Bax now has a three game point streak (2-2-4) and six points (2-4-6) in four of his last five games. Lammens has also been hot with points in four of his last five games (3-1-4). Beamish also has a current four game point streak (1-5-6), and Hurt has four helpers in his last five games.
Kingston goaltender Matthew Minchak stopped 23 of 25 shots and was selected as the second star. Sarnia out-shot Kingston 28-15 and dominated in the face-off circle 29-17. Both teams went 0/5 on the power-play.
The first period saw both teams trading goals with Nolan Buttar scoring for the Frontenacs early at 1:26 from Sarnia native Matthew Henderson and Will Bishop. Moments later Osipenko made a nice save on Landon Wright on a partial break-away. Pickell scored the equalizer late in the period at 18:54. Pickell was denied twice by Minchak and as he made his way to the front of the net he jumped on a loose puck and slipped it into the net under the left pad of Minchak. Sarnia out-shot Kingston 10-8.
The Sting scored the lone goal in the second period as Lammens worked from the corner and was able to get the puck to the front of the net. Beamish’s shot was stopped by Minchak, but the rebound came to Van Volsen, who scored on the stick side at 16:59. For the second straight period the Sting out-shot the Frontenacs 6-4.
