The Greater Sudbury Cubs kicked off their Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League season in just the right way on Sept. 7 — with a win.
Cameron Walker and Samuel Assinewai earned two goals apiece to lead the team to a 7-4 win over the Hearst Lumberjacks on Thursday at the Gerry McCrory Countryside Sports Complex.
The Cubs struck first as Hudson Chitaroni and Zachary Major teamed up to feed Marshall McCharles who beat Hearst netminder Tristan Boileau at 4:19.
The Lumberjacks bounced right back when Owen Hay picked up his first NOJHL goal just 38 seconds later, wheeling out of the corner into the slot and roofing a shot over the glove of Greater Sudbury starter Noah Metivier.
Chitaroni got the lead back for the Cubs as he steered in a cross-ice feed from teammate Hudson Martin.
With the Cubs up 2-1, Hearst managed to tie it up at 15:05 of the second after Alex McDonald fed a pass to Tyler Patterson at the top of the crease, who put the puck passed Metivier to make it a 2-2 game.
Twenty-five seconds later, Brady Bouchard fired a snap shot from the point toward the Lumberjacks’ net that Cameron Walker tipped passed Boileau to make it 3-2 Sudbury.
Walker would do it all again a short time later after McCharles sent a pass over that he one-timed into the net to make it 4-2.
Moving onto the third, the Cubs made it 5-2 after Assinewai corralled a bouncing puck and lifted it into the upper right corner of the net.
The final six minutes of the game proved high-scoring with both teams scoring two goals apiece.
Ben Lacroix scored his first as a Cub at 14:52 to make it 6-2 for Sudbury. Maddoc Newton would make it 6-3 when he scored one off the faceoff for Hearst.
Assinewai came back with another goal moments later though, scoring his second of the evening to make it 7-3 for the Cubs.
The Lumberjacks wrapped up the night’s scoring on a late power play with Patterson scoring his second of the game, with help from Liam Boswell and Mathieu Comeau.
The win for Metivier was his 40th in the NOJHL.
Greater Sudbury is right back at it Friday against defending NOJHL champion Timmins Rock. The puck drops at 7:05 p.m. at the Gerry McCrory Countryside Sports Complex.
All NOJHL games are streamed live, and on demand, via FLOHockey.tv.
