BY SCOTT HUNTER HADDOW
When the Sudbury Wolves' offensive
machine finally got rolling against the Peterborough Petes, it
was impressive.
The Wolves exploded for five goals in the
third period of Sunday's afternoon contest at the Sudbury
arena en route to a 7-2 thrashing of the Petes.
Once again, Wolves rookie Ben Pouliot was
front and centre in the impressive offensive explosion, as he
ripped two goals, giving him eight for the season.
The game was a rather dull affair for the
first two periods. The Wolves held a tight 2-1 lead going into
the third frame before the goal-scoring outburst.
Head coach and general manager Mike Foligno
was quick to point out that his troops stuck to the game plan,
resulting in the winning effort.
"You're faced with adversity a little bit
to start that game, we had to kill off a few penalties in a row
and then all of a sudden we get our power play opportunities
and we don't capitalize, so you're thinking, as a
player, do we change it all up?, or do we do our own thing, or
stick with the game plan," said Foligno.
"For the most part we tried to get in their
heads to stay with the game plan. They really worked it to a
tee in the third period. We wore them down a little bit. Guys
started capitalizing. We stayed with it, and the guys had a
little extra hop in their skating, and then we started
generating offence. It was a good, solid effort."
The offensive outburst did wonders for the
teams' collective confidence.
"I think we have the offence in this room to
do that every game," said Bobby Chaumont. "In the third period,
we played as a team and every line was rolling. We got power
play goals and even strength goals. It went really well.
"Against the Brampton Battalion (on Friday
night) we had plenty of chances, but the puck wasn't going
in. Today, we really threw the puck at the net, the result was
seven goals, so we have to keep doing that, and we will be
successful."
The Wolves opened the scoring in the first
period when Mike Mills tapped the puck past Petes' goalie
Jeff MacDougald at 9:43.
The Petes tied the game early on the power
play in the second period when Liam Reddox jammed the puck past
Wolves' goalie Patrick Ehelechner at 1:49.
The teams remained tied until late in the
second frame when Ryan hastings' big blast from the point
made its way through traffic and eluded MacDougald at
19:09.
Then the Wolves offence came alive in a big
way.
In a span of 1:31, the Wolves pumped three
goals past a hapless MacDougald.
Stefan Blaho danced into the slot and roofed
a hard shot upstairs to make it 3-1 at 4:26.
Seconds later, Pouliot zoomed into the high
slot and wired a perfect wrist shot past MacDougald at
5:14.
Then, Luke dubbin scored on the power play at
5:57 to make it 5-1.
Pouliot and Rafal Martynowski rounded out the
scoring for the Wolves.
Sudbury native and Petes' forward Jadran
Beljo engaged Wolves' defenceman Thomas Sample with
disastrous results. Sample fed Beljo a series of hard punches
before dispatching him equally hard to the ice.
Mark Flood tallied a late goal for the Petes,
but it was too little, too late, as the Wolves skated away with
the two points, placing them third in the Central Division with
12 points. The Mississauga IceDogs sit second, with 13
points.
On Friday night, the Wolves tied the Brampton
Battalion 2-2 at the Sudbury Arena.
Ryan McDonough and Kyle Musselman scored for
the Wolves.
Ehelechner was solid, making 36 saves.
The Wolves are on the road this weekend. On
Friday, Oct. 22, the Wolves take on the Guelph Storm. On
Saturday, they play the Erie Otters. Finally, on Sunday, the
Wolves square off against the Brampton Battalion.