With a nine-point lead over their next closest rival, the Greater Sudbury Cubs continue to enjoy a commanding lead over the Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League.
That was very much in evidence on Thursday night when the team skated to a 6-2 win over the visiting Powassan Voodoos.
The Cubs opened the scoring on the power play after Ben Harris won a draw to Daks Klinkhammer who circled up top and whipped a long shot past Powassan netminder Tyson Wilcox to make it 1-0.
This was Klinkhammer’s sixth point in as many games.
Ten minutes later, Greater Sudbury was on the power play again. NOJHL points leader Lucas Signoretti fired a low attempt to the net that was steered in by Nolan Newton, giving the Cubs a 2-0 lead.
“Dating back to last season, Newton has points in his past 11 NOJHL outings, while with the second assist, Samuel Assinewai is now on a nine-game heater for the NOJHL front-runners.”
Sudbury would make it 3-0 before the period ended when Jacob Lamoureux lifted in a close-range backhand at 16:41.
The Voodoos managed to make it 3-1 just prior to the intermission. Riley Misa snapping a shot from the right circle off the faceoff that got under Greater Sudbury goaltender Stephen Toltl.
Moving onto the second period, Klinkhammer collected his second of the night, batting one in off a shot from defenceman Gabriel Grobanopoulos, making the score 4-1.
Cameron Shanks would add a buzzer-beater at 19:59 of the second, giving the Cubs a 5-1 lead.
The third period would go scoreless for nine minutes.
Then, Powassan’s Samuel Rivet sent in a knuckler from inside the blueline that tumbled into the Cubs net at 9:06 to make it 5-2.
But Lucas Signoretti wasn’t done getting points and he tipped in one final goal, off a Jacob Signoretti chance, giving him 23 goals on the season and leading to a final score of 6-2.
Greater Sudbury skated away with their league-best 11th home victory, while raising their overall record to 21-2-1-1.
In defeat, Powassan fell to 10-10-0-3.
