Greyhounds hold off late surge by Attack (video)

The Soo Greyhounds remain undefeated early on in the Ontario Hockey League season but the team believes there is still plenty of work to be done.

The Greyhounds built up a 5-0 lead on Saturday night and would eventually beat the Owen Sound Attack 7-4, improving to 6-0-0-0 in the process.

After opening up the lead, the Greyhounds would surrender four of the next six goals in the game, sealing the win with an empty net goal with 15 seconds left.

“We did a really nice job in building the lead,” said Greyhounds Coach Sheldon Keefe, “but I’m just not happy that we opened the door and let the other team right back in the game. I’d like to see us do a better job there. It’s part of the growing process as a team is to learn how to close out those games.”

“We’ve got to adjust our game,” Keefe also said. “They need to score, all we need is the puck. We’ve just got to learn.”

The Attack used a surge in the second half of the game, cutting the Greyhounds lead to 5-3 thanks to a pair of goals by Kyle Platzer but the Attack couldn’t complete the comeback.

“I really liked our rally,” said Attack coach Greg Ireland. “Our guys realize that they’re always in the fight. I certainly thought that we come out and dominated that third period. I loved out get up and go. I’m really proud of our group. By no means are we ever happy with a loss but we can build on that.”

Ireland commended his team, despite the loss.

“We made two mistakes in the first period but we did a lot of good things in the first period,” said Ireland. “We made two mistakes that ended up in our net. We need to shoot the puck more and get out of this habit of making an extra pass. There was an eight or nine minute span in the second period (that hurt).”

Ireland credited the play of Jonah Gadjovich, and Justin Brack in the game.

“Pats on the back need to go to our foot soldiers,” said Ireland. “Guys that don’t often get mentioned deserve a pat on the back. They were a rallying point and gave us some energy.”

The Greyhounds surrendered a power play goal and shorthanded goal in the win.

“Owen Sound has scored more goals than any team on the power play and they were able to grow that number tonight,” said Keefe. “It’s a very dangerous team on the power play and we knew that coming in. That really opened the door to let them back into things.”

Tyler Ganly and Jared McCann had a goal and two assists each in the win while Zach Senyshyn chipped in with a pair of goals. Sergey Tolchinsky (one goal, one assist), Blake Speers (one goal, one assist), Hayden Verbeek (two assists) and Jean Dupuy (two assists) also had multi-point nights for the Greyhounds. Michael Bunting also scored in the win. Goaltender Brandon Halverson stopped 34 shots in the game.

“I’m not happy with how things played out there but now that the game is over, our team needs that,” said Keefe. “We don’t want to put ourselves in that predicament. It’s a tough thing. We need that. I told them that I’d rather we save it for when we’ve got a 2-1 or 3-1 lead and we’ve got to find a way to grind it out like that. Big picture, it’s better for our team to go through that than another blowout like we had the other night.”

Platzer had two goals and an assist for Owen Sound while Chris Bigras chipped in with a goal and an assist. Santino Centorame set up a pair of goals in the loss while defenceman Thomas Schemitsch also scored.

Jack Flinn got the start for Owen Sound, stopping 24 of 29 shots before being pulled after the Greyhounds fifth goal. Brandon Hope came in and stopped 11 of the 12 shots he faced with the final Greyhounds goal coming into an empty net.

The Greyhounds see a quick turnaround as they are back in action on Sunday afternoon when they host the London Knights in a 2 p.m. puck drop at the Essar Centre.

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AROUND THE OHL

In Erie, Mason Marchment had the shootout winner as the Erie Otters beat the Kitchener Rangers 5-4. Dylan Strome had a pair of goals for Erie while Justin Bailey had three goals for Kitchener.

In Belleville, Jake Marchment had two goals and an assist to lead the Belleville Bulls to an 8-5 win over the Niagara IceDogs. Matt Luff added a goal and two assists for the Bulls in the win.

In Plymouth, Connor Chatham had three goals while Matt Mistele and Francesco Vilardi added a goal and two assists each as the Plymouth Whalers beat the Peterborough Petes 8-4.

In Sarnia, a six-goal second period led the Sarnia Sting to a 9-2 win over the Windsor Spitfires. Nikita Korostelev scored three times and set up two more goals for the Sting. Davis Brown added a pair of goals while Jordan Kryou and Pavel Zacha chipped in with a goal and two assists each.

In Saginaw, Brett Welychka scored on the power play at 1:06 of overtime to lift the London Knights to a 3-2 win over the Saginaw Spirit. Goaltender Michael Giugovaz stopped 39 shots in the win.

In Barrie, Andrew Mangiapane scored twice and set up another goal as the Barrie Colts beat the Sudbury Wolves 6-4. Justin Scott scored twice in the win while Cordell James, Kevin Labanc and Josh Carrick set up two goals each for the Colts. Matt Schmalz scored twice for Sudbury.

File photo of Greyhounds forward Zach Senyshyn by Kenneth Armstrong/SooToday

To check out SooToday's live blog of Saturday's game, click here

For video highlights, click here