The Sudbury Wolves were looking to extend their win streak when they welcomed the Oshawa Generals to Sudbury Arena on Sunday afternoon, but the hockey gods had other plans.
Coming off a 3-1 over the Sarnia Sting on Friday night on home ice, the Pack was looking to keep the momentum going.
And while things looked good in the early goings, with the Wolves jumping out to a 3-0 lead, six unanswered goals from the Generals saw that lead disintegrate into a 6-3 loss that drops the team’s record to 9-19-1. This sees Sudbury in the basement of the Ontario Hockey League standings, 18th out of the league’s 20 teams.
On Sunday, Jaden Cholette was the starting goaltender for the Oshawa Generals while Karsen Chartier was once again between the pipes for the Sudbury Wolves.
At the 6:44 mark of the first period, the Sudbury Wolves grabbed a 1-0 lead with Artem Gonchar’s seventh goal of the season from right in close on Cholette, assisted by Vladimir Provorov, which would be the only goal of the period.
Vladimir Provorov put the puck behind Cholette 3:13 into the second period, for his first career Ontario Hockey League goal with a wrist shot on Cholettes’ glove side, assisted by Alex Pharand and Daniel Berehowsky, increasing Sudbury’s lead to 2-0.
With 11:41 left in the second, Ethan Dean scored for Sudbury completing a nice passing play by the Wolves, with the assists going to Artem Gonchar and Blake Clayton, giving the Wolves a 3-0 lead.
Just 1:04 later, Onni Kalto scored his fifth goal of the season after deking around Chartier, assisted by Luke Posthumus and Haoxi Wang, giving the Generals their first goal of the game, now finding themselves trailing 3-1.
Just over halfway through the middle frame, Owen Griffin for Oshawa found himself all alone in front of Chartier and scored his 14th goal of the season, assisted by Posthumus and Brady Blaseg, making the score 3-2 for Sudbury after the first 40 minutes of play.
At around 8:07 of the third period, Oshawa tied the game thanks to Posthumus’ seventh goal of the season, a slap shot past Chartier, with the assist going to Wang, making the score 3-3.
With Wolves’ Captain Nathan Villeneuve serving a two-minute minor penalty for roughing, resulting in a power play goal from Harrison Franssen with a one-timer, his ninth of the season, assisted by Lucas Moore and Owen Griffin, putting Oshawa in front by 4-3.
Just 40 seconds later, and with Luca Blonda serving a minor penalty for checking from behind, Franssen scored his second of the game for Oshawa, this one also on the power play with another one timed shot, assisted by Aiden O’Donnell and Posthumus, giving the Gens a 5-3 lead.
Oshawa sealed the comeback 6-3 victory with an empty net goal scored by O’Donnell, with the only assist going to Franssen.
The Sudbury Wolves look to get back on the winning side of things on Dec. 12, at home against the Owen Sound Attack, with puck drop scheduled for 7:05 p.m.
Super fan Robert McCarthy covers Sudbury Wolves and Sudbury Five games for Sudbury.com. Got a question for Robert? Email it to [email protected].