The Greater Sudbury Cubs took a 3-1 playoff series lead over the Blind River Beavers and they did it in solid fashion in front of a hometown crowd on April 9.
For the vast majority of the 2023-24 regular season, the Beavers and Cubs were first and second in the Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League, making this playoff series highly anticipated.
Game 4 of the series saw Greater Sudbury score three times in 16 minutes to take a commanding early lead and never looking back until the final buzzer. When the dust settled, the Cubs had mauled the Beavers 9-2, thanks in part to a big game from Nolan Newton.
Greater Sudbury took the lead on an early power play, scoring just 4:20 into the game.
“On the tally, Newton started a rush into the Blind River zone, before eventually taking a return cross-ice feed from Hudson Chitaroni and slamming it into the open corner on Beavers’ starter Gavin Disano,” states the game report.
Less than three minutes later, Greater Sudbury did it all over again. Breaking out during a transition, a give-and-go saw Newton and Chitaroni go back and forth, with Chitaroni beating Disano to make it a 2-0 Cubs’ game.
A few minutes after that, the Cubs were back at it. At 11:23, Chitaroni sent the puck over to Newton speeding to the Beavers’ net, who snapped in his second of the game and eighth of the playoffs.
Blind River pulled Disano at this point and put Noah Tegelaar in for relief.
While battling it out four-on-four, the Beavers’ Daniel Vasic forced a turnover and grabbed the puck, beating Cubs’ goalie Noah Metiiver in the bottom right corner to make it 3-1.
“Hitting his hat trick a couple of shifts later, Newton tipped in a sizzler from the high slot from Josh Kavanagh, during a man advantage,” the report states.
Moving onto the second period, the Cubs’ Ethan Larmand made it 5-1 by guiding in an Oliver Smith pass from the left circle. It was 6-1 quite quickly though, as Marshall McCharles stuffed in a rebound that was knocked free by Newton.
Blind River’s Josh Thompson made it 6-2 after he cleared the puck from his own end, zoomed down the right wing and ripped it past Metivier.
“Regaining their five-goal cushion late in the session, defenceman Justin Seguin hammered a blast from up high that flew into the top corner.”
Now up 7-2 and up a skater early in the third, the Cubs’ Hudson Martin teed up Larmand, who blasted his second goal of the game from the right circle to make it 8-2.
The Cubs’ final goal came shorthanded at 7:35 of the third after Chitaroni redirected a shot from Cameron Shanks to make it 9-2.
With the Cubs up 3-1 in the best-of-seven series, Game 5 goes Thursday in Blind River at 7 p.m.
- Game 1: Cubs 2 Beavers 1
- Game 2: Beavers 6 Cubs 2
- Game 3: Cubs 5 Beavers 1
- Game 4: Cubs 9 Beavers 2
- Game 5: Thursday, April 11 @ Blind River 7 p.m. (Blind River Community Centre)
- Game 6*: Sunday, April 14 @ Sudbury 7:35 p.m. (Gerry McCrory Countryside Sports Complex)
- Game 7*: Tuesday, April 16 @ Blind River 7 p.m. (Blind River Community Centre) *-if necessary