By: Daniel Vazzoler
It was a special performance from Sam Knoblauch on Friday night as he picked up five points in a 6-2 Carleton Place Canadians win over the Navan Grads.
His night got started early as it took Knoblauch just 1:19 into the first period to open the scoring before adding a pair of assists before the intermission. He scored late in the second period before wrapping up his scoring with his third assist midway through the third period.
“Just have to hand it to the power play and to my line-mates,” Knoblauch said. “Those guys were always in the right spots and, usually when I get the puck, I have a good idea on where they’re going to be. Whether it’s on the power play or 5-on-5 with (Geoff) Kitt and (Justin) Cmunt, those guys are in the right places and they make the right decisions with the puck so it’s easy for me.”
Canadians coach Jason Clarke heaped praise onto Knoblauch after the game, but it wasn’t just for his effort in the attacking zone.
“Can’t say enough about Sam Knoblauch, he’s an absolute warrior. Plays hard, plays both ends of the rink, 200-foot guy, smart, I mean he’s the best player in our league by far,” Clarke exclaimed.
It was a physical game with a lot of feistiness and had both teams cutting ruts towards the penalty box for most of the night. Each team ended the game with 10 power play opportunities and Navan and Carleton Place combined for 70 minutes in penalties on 31 infractions. Things were relatively calm in the first period as five of the 31 penalties came in the opening frame.
It was the second period where discipline appeared to be thrown out the window and the officials had a difficult time in reigning everyone back in.
“(The penalties) slowed things down, with the 5-on-3’s we had to use a lot of the same personnel and slowed the game down,” Clarke said. “Guys were tired but the guys killing penalties did a very, very good job. We were really happy as a staff with the way we dealt with the adversity in the second period.”
The praise Clarke gave the Canadians penalty killing unit might be selling it short as they were perfect in the game, killing off all 10 Grads power plays.
Navan didn’t have the same success when its players were in the penalty box as four of the six Canadians goals came with the man advantage.
“We were very happy with the power play the last few games, but I think the puck hasn’t been going in the net as much as we would have liked,” Knoblauch said. “Today, we moved the puck quick (because) they played more of an aggressive PK. We’ve been working on a lot of plays and we know where each other is going to be. The puck went in the net today, which is a good thing.”
Brett Thorne scored the Canadians first power play goal, getting it 4:41 into the first period. Knoblauch found the defenceman across the slot and passed the puck to Thorne who finished the play for his first career CCHL goal.
“Feels good to get the first one under the belt, hopefully I can get a few more as the season goes on but a goal’s a goal and it is what it is,” Thorne said.
Friday’s game continued a quartet of Canadians streaks as the team’s winning streak was pushed to 10 games. Connor Hill picked up an assist to get his point streak to six games. Knoblauch now has a seven-game point streak and, thanks to Friday’s performance, is now averaging more than two points per game over that stretch – 15 points in the seven games. But the leagues longest, active hot streak belongs to Kitt as his two assists on Friday extends his point streak to nine games, with 13 points in that period.
They will all look to keep those streaks going on Sunday when the Canadians travel to face the Nepean Raiders to start off a string of three games away from the Carleton Place Arena. The marquee match-up will be on Wednesday when Carleton Place faces off with the Ottawa Jr Senators. The road swing wraps up with a game against the Rockland Nationals.
The Canadians are back on home ice on Nov. 5 when they host the Kemptville 73’s for an afternoon meeting with puck drop at 3 p.m.
