Another epic comeback required for win against Hawkesbury

By: Daniel Vazzoler

The 2018-19 Carleton Place Canadians may go down in team history as “The Cardiac Kids” as, for the second time in a little less than two weeks, they erased a three-goal deficit in the third period to pick up the win, this time a 4-3 over-time victory against the Hawkesbury Hawks on Sunday.

Carleton Place has struggled in the first 40 minutes in each of its last four home games but, in three of the four, has managed to get the game into over-time and come away with the win. The first two times were over the Thanksgiving weekend against the Kemptville 73’s and the Cornwall Colts. Sunday’s comeback win was against stiffer opposition as the Hawks entered the game one point ahead of Carleton Place.

But a three-goal lead in the final six minutes wasn’t enough to keep the Canadians at bay.

Down 3-0 with 5:46 remaining in regulation, Jackson Sterrett scored the Canadians first goal of the game and his power play goal seemed to give Carleton Place a bit of a boost in momentum.

“After the second period, we just decided we needed to get pucks on net and that’s what happened there,” Sterrett said about his goal. “I think it was Henry (Enebak) who just smacked it towards the net and it bounced over the goalie. The puck was on the goal-line and I just tapped it in.

“We have no quit on this team, we work the hardest out of any team in this league and we know we do, so we know we have to come out with the win.”

Carleton Place kept the pressure on Hawkesbury after the first goal and 1:58 later, the pressure paid off with Elliott McDermott bringing the Canadians to within one goal. The Hawks looked shaken up after the goal, but not because of the goal, but rather they thought the play was off-side – and that perceived lack of focus ended up costing them.

Less than a minute after McDermott’s goal, Peyton Francis brought the team back level with the Hawks as he one-timed the Andrej Hromic pass into the goal to tie the game. Matthew Petizian made an acrobatic effort to try and make the save, but only caught a pice of the puck before it looped over him and into the back of the net.

“You could see out there, I was pretty happy to get that one,” Francis said. “I was just happy that we were able to come back and tie the game up but, to be able to score that goal, it was a great pass from Hromic. He fed me back door there and I was able to put it in. You could see the emotion on the ice.”

While Carleton Place was able to come from behind to get the victory, the worrying fact remains that the team got off to another slow start, forcing it to have to come from behind again on home ice.

“It was a rough start for us, we had chances, hit a couple of posts but then we slowed down for a bit when they scored,” said Canadians assistant coach Steve Maxwell. “We got better as the game went on and battled through to get the win.”

“We have 14 new guys (this season), so the leadership group has to help the guys understand that other teams are going to play us hard and we get everyone’s ‘A’-game and we can’t play 20 minutes, we have to play 60 minutes,” added coach Jason Clarke.

Clarke also said the team’s ability to come from behind like they have shows the character level in the group but added the coaching staff and the players need to find a way to get the effort shown in the final five minutes on Sunday’s game to be the norm for a full game.

Carleton Place now has a few days to try and address the slow starts with a road trip coming up, facing two of the teams it came back to beat.

“It’ll be two tough games because we came from behind against both teams here on home ice, beat Cornwall in over-time and beat Hawkesbury in over-time and they’re going to want a piece of us,” Clarke said. “It’ll be a good test for us this weekend.”

The Canadians will travel to face Cornwall on the Thursday before continuing their trip into Hawkesbury for a game Friday night. Then it is a home-and-home series against the Navan Grads with nearly a week between the two games as Navan plays host on Sunday before travelling to the Carleton Place Arena the following Friday.