Wolves Do It Again in OT
The Sudbury Wolves and Ottawa 67’s played Game 3 of their Eastern Conference Quarterfinals at the Sudbury Arena on Tuesday night. The Wolves had to play comeback and dug their way to a 5 – 4 win in overtime to take a commanding 3 – 0 lead in the series.
The 67’s came to play on Tuesday night and put the pressure on the Pack early on in the first period but it was ERIC O’DELL (FRANK SCHUMACHER, JOSHUA LEIVO) who got the Wolves to the 1 – 0 lead midway through the frame. The 67’s responded just over two minutes later with Steven Janes netting his first of the postseason to tie the contest 1 – 1.
The team’s remainded tied into the second period when JOSH MCFADDEN (MICHAEL MACDONALD) riffled a bullet past netminder Petr Mrazek to give the Wolves the 2 – 1 lead. The 67’s were not going down without a fight – as they tied the game 2 – 2 on a goal from Sean Monahan. The 67’s continued to apply pressure and take advantage of Wolves miscues which culminated into two quick goals from Ben Dubois and Marc Zanetti to take the 4 – 2 lead into the intermission.
The Wolves went to work and pulled within one at the 5:02 mark when MCFADDEN (O’DELL, MIKE LOMAS) slapped one by Mrazek on the powerplay for his second goal of the game. The Pack seemed to be unable to find the equalizer as the period went one…but at the 17:42 minute of the frame, the Wolves went on the powerplay and MCFADDEN scored his third goal on the night with 16.6 seconds left in the regulation to tie the game 4 – 4 and send the teams to overtime and the crowd into a frenzy.
Once in overtime, GREG JAMBROSICH had a nice rush into the offensive zone and LOMAS buried the winner just 33 seconds into the overtime frame to give the Wolves the 5 – 4 win and the 3 – 0 series lead much to the delight of the 4427 in attendance.
ALAIN VALIQUETTE had another solid night in goal making 31 saves for the win, while Petr Mrazek was good again making 36 saves for the loss.
The game’s three stars were: JOSH MCFADDEN, MIKE LOMAS, and STEVEN JANES.
The series now heads back to Ottawa for Game 4 on Thursday, March 31 and Game 5 on Saturday, April 2 (if necessary).
