The boys traveled to
Hensall Friday morning to face Mt. Brydges in their first contest to begin the round robin in the South Huron Silver Stick Regional Qualifier.
The Meteor’s game plan was obvious …….set the tone early going into the points per period format. The first three line changes were completed for Mitchell with the play isolated in the Mt. Brydges zone. Soon after, Mt. Brydges hit the scoreboard with the opening goal just after the two minute mark. First period play would end with the local boys down 1-0. The bench talk between periods to the boys centered on their awesome effort, the lack of snow (on the ice) in the defensive end and the fact that there were NO defensive face offs in their zone all period.
The second period would end scoreless for both sides even though Mt. Brydges faced a double minor penalty. Mitchell continued their strong defensive zone play by yielding only three face offs in their end.
The third period saw the Mitchell squad take their only penalty of the game of which they were able to kill off successfully. Mt Brydges added insurance five minutes into the period and again two minutes later to go up 3-0. They would add an empty netter to end the game 4-0.
Once again the Mitchell boys played solid defensively in their end allowing only two defensive face offs.
Normally a win is a win and a loss is a loss and that is all that matters or with this being a points by period format one would think that is the most important thing too. But given this was round robin play the MESSAGE the boys sent reverberated through the entire Mt. Brydges team. Even the Mt Brydges parents commented that the scoreboard was by no means a true indication of how close the game truly was.
Game 2 that afternoon was against St. Mary’s Rock. The first period was scoreless with both teams gaining a single point for the tie. Once again the Meteor’s held the opposition to two defensive face-offs and out shot them 7-3.
Mitchell’s Kurtis Eisler would open the scoring for the Meteor’s in the final minute of the second with help from Steven Bird and Jacob Laing. The second ended with Mitchell out shooting the Rock 10-3 and controlling face offs in the two periods 16-6.
Four minutes into the third Mitchell’s Andrew Feltz caused a turn over in the neutral zone getting the puck to Quaid Austin who in turn busted wide around the defender to get a clear shot and make it 2-0. Five minutes later the line of Curtis Lockhart, Riley Sykes & Eisler combined to cash in on a power play goal by Lockhart to finish off St. Mary’s 3-0. The work ethic of the boys continued to put up the solid numbers in the specialty teams – face offs and shots on goals were in Mitchell’s favour 24-11 and 30-11 respectively. Mitchell came away with 10 points of a possible 11.