By: Daniel Vazzoler
The Carleton Place Canadians fell behind early in Monday’s game against the Cornwall Colts but came back to get a 4-3 win in over-time.
Carleton Place came from behind to erase a first period 2-0 Cornwall lead to get a lead of their own, only to see it slip away from them in the third period. In the extra frame, Zach Tupker ensured the comeback effort wasn’t wasted as he scored the game-winning goal.
“It was just a regroup in the neutral zone and I saw Cade (Townend) give the puck to Ben (Tupker),” he said, describing the winning goal. “I saw I had a step on the defenceman so I went to the net. Fortunate that Ben made a really good play and I just tried to get the puck on net.”
Zach did just that as he tipped Ben’s saucer pass over the shoulder of Colts goalie Michael Carr for the over-time goal.
It was another game where the Canadians dominated the shots but, unlike Sunday’s dominant 10-0 win over the Nepean Raiders, the score was much closer than the 48-18 shots totals indicated.
“Automatically people think that (Sunday’s game) is what you jump to,” said Townend, the Canadians captain, about falling behind early, “but playing two games in two days is not easy. That’s when you’ve just got to stick to the basics and work hard.”
The Canadians did just that in order to erase a 2-0 Cornwall lead – created by Josh Barnes fanning on the puck multiple times before finally finding it and a hole past Connor Murphy for the first goal, and then David Poirier finishing off the 2-on-1 rush.
A quick response from Sam Allison to the second goal helped turn the momentum in the game as the Canadians then put the pressure on Carr.
Henry Enebak scored early in the second period to tie the game with a power play goal just 0:07 after the man-advantage started, as he snuck out of the corner with the puck and beat Carr on the short-side.
Townend then gave the Canadians the lead with the team’s second power play goal, slipping his shot through Carr’s legs in the third period, before Isaac Testani tied the game 2:25 later.
The Carleton Place power play had a strong pair of games over the weekend, going a combined 6-for-10 in the two wins – something the team needed after being a middle of the pack unit and being quite anemic to start the season.
“We’ve been moving our feet, having quick looks, not letting them to get too set up and then making quick attacks,” Zach said. “Just getting pucks on net, getting a lot of screens on the goalie so he can’t see anything and make his night a tough one.”
“We’ve been focusing on trying to out-man the other team at the net,” added Canadians coach Jason Clarke. “I think that’s really important, we worked on it in practice this week and we were able to do a really good job of it.”
While the comeback shows the character the Canadians have in the room, Clarke said his team can’t afford to fall behind early in games moving forward – especially on home ice, as has been the case in the last two home games where Carleton Place had to go to over-time to get the win in both cases.
“We can’t find ourselves in these two-goal holes and three-goal holes at home, to me that’s unacceptable,” he reiterated. “You can’t really win when it counts, in the playoffs, when you’re giving up two and three goal leads. We need to be a little more consistent with the way we play.”
The next test for that consistency will come on the weekend when the Ottawa Jr. Senators will return to the place where they won the Bogart Cup last year as they visit the Carleton Place Arena on Friday. Then the 15th-ranked Jr. A team in Canada, the Hawkesbury Hawks, will play in the Carleton Place Arena on Sunday – the Canadians were ranked 19th in the latest list provided by the Canadian Junior Hockey League.
