It was a case of next man up for the shorthanded Sudbury Wolves who scored six goals in a game for the third time this season, getting a much needed divisional win, 6-4 over Niagara.
Just two days after a big loss to the same IceDogs on Friday the Wolves responded, and it was not just a 3-1 loss, the Wolves also lost three players to suspension.
Zach Wilkie was given a five game suspension, Michael Pezzetta 10 for a check to the head and C.J. Yakimowicz is out indefinitely after an incident with a referee.
So those that were left stepped up, logging heavy penalty kill minutes and a couple Wolves used the opportunity to break out of slumps.
David Levin had his first multi-point game since October 16th and first multi-goal game of his career.
Alan Lyszczarczyk added three assists giving him his first three point game since February last season.
“We need those guys to be our best players, night in and night out offensively and tonight they were, and if we keep playing like that we’re going to be in good shape,” said Wolves Assistant Coach Darryl Moxam.
The Wolves don’t play until Wednesday and for David Levin, that’s too long.
“Sometimes you don’t have your best games but you still have to work, but sometimes it comes like today,” said Levin.“I just want to play tomorrow.”
Ryan Valentini also got in on the action for his second two goal game in his last four games.
With three forwards out, Drake Pilon is also still serving an eight game suspension, it was four forwards for the Wolves getting six goals.
But the coaching staff believes it was a complete team effort, and highlighted the play of their young players.
It’s going to be those young players who have to step up in the next little while.
“They’re going to get it for the next ten games, we have no choice, they have to be big for us,” said Moxam.
The Wolves led 5-1 at one point but it was no surprise what hurt the Wolves, penalties, as the most penalized team in the OHL found themselves on the PK eight times on the afternoon.
“I think Matty(Dave Matsos) said it best, he said we got away with this on a Sunday. If we do this on a Friday night with a game maybe Saturday or another game on Sunday, we’re in big trouble. Obviously our penalty killers are exhausted you could see it halfway through the second that some of them started to labour a bit, we’re fortunate its Sunday,” said Momax.
Those penalties led to two power play goals for an IceDogs team that is dead last in the OHL on the man advantage.
“We don’t make anything easy on ourselves,” said Moxam.
The IceDogs rallied making it a close contest but when Niagara started to push, Sudbury pushed back controlling the offensive zone for most of the third period.
“I told the guys after the game in Niagara, I thought it could be a turning point, I thought it was a 20 person effort that night. We started doing a lot of little things really really well, and I thought that carried over to tonight. Having the ability to stop somebody when they’re gaining momentum is not an easy thing to do in this league,” said Moxam.
The physicality of Friday’s game carried over into Sunday’s game, even with the culprits for the Wolves suspended.
Alan Lyszczarczyk dropped the gloves, not known as a fighter, he held is own winning the fight against Johnathon Shaefer.
“I think I watch too much UFC, so I try to do it the same as Connor McGregor,” said Lyszczarczyk.
The Wolves scored three goals in each of the first two periods.
The first goal of the game came as David Levin dropped a pass off to Ben Garagan in front of the net, and Garagan netted his first of the season.
Ryan Valentini scored a goal you will likely find on a highlight reel somewhere as he weaved in an out of a few IceDogs defenders scoring his 8th of the year.
Akil Thomas responded for Niagara 19 seconds later.
Valentini then scored his 9th on the year on the power play from Dmitry Sokolov and Kyle Capobianco.
After one period it was 3-1 Sudbury.
The second period opened up with a second power play goal for Sudbury, a backhand goal from Liam Dunda, his 4th of the year.
David Levin then got in on the action making it 5-1 for Sudbury.
Pavel Demin made it 5-2, before Levin added his 7th of the season of a beautiful pass from Lyszczarczyk.
Levin was in front of the net on the left side of the net when Lyszczarczyk slid a hard pass through everybody right on the stick of Levin.
“I just needed to put my stick there and he got me,” said Levin.
Akil Thomas got one back for Niagara making it 6-3 Sudbury.
The third period saw some offensive domination from Sudbury and just one goal, after 9 combined through two periods.
Kyle Langdon made it 6-4, but that’s as close as the IceDogs would come.
It was just the 8th game this season that Sudbury outshot their opponent 41-37.
Zack Bowman got the afternoon off giving way to Jake McGrath who stopped 33 of 37 shots for his 6th with of the year.
Sudbury moves into a tie for sixth in the Eastern Conference with the win.
They will head to Hamilton for a Wednesday game in the Steel city before coming back to Sudbury for a Friday game against North Bay and Saturday against Barrie.
