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Photo Credit: Freeze Frame Photos
On Thursday, January 23rd, the seventh place (18-18-1-2) Soo Thunderbirds hit the ice at the McIntyre Arena in Timmins, Ontario to open a three game road trip with meeting the fifth place (23-14) Timmins Rock in NOJHL action. The Rock sit in fifth with 46 points while the Thunderbirds are seven points back of Timmins heading into Thursday’s contest.
At 13:57 of the opening period from just outside of the Thunderbird blueline, Braedyn Cyr fires a shot on the Soo net to be directed off the tip of Colin Chestnut’s stick to find the back of Thunderbird netminder Noah Metivier’s net to give Timmins a 1 – 0 lead on Cyr’s fifth goal of the season. Luca Lowe picks up a rebound off of Thunderbird netminder Noah Metivier in front of the Soo’s crease to slide the Rock’s second goal of the game to give the hosts a 2 – 0 lead on Lowe’s 15th of the season. With the Rock on a powerplay and only 68 seconds into the final period, Kaeden McArthur rifles a snapshot from the right faceoff circle to find the back of the Thunderbirds’ net under Noah Metivier’s blocker to bring Timmins’ lead to 3 – 0. Brant Romaniuk registered the loan helper on McArthur’s 14th of the season. Scoring his second of the game, Rock defenseman Kaeden McArthur fires a wrist shot from the right faceoff circle with the puck bouncing off the crossbar into the back of the Thunderbirds’ net to give Timmins a 4 – 0 win. Brant Romaniuk and Thomas Beard drew the assists on McArthur’s second powerplay marker of the game at 15:10 of the third. Timmins 17 year old goaltender Dryden Riley earned his third shutout of the season with stopping 24 of 24 shots in the Rock’s 4 – 0 win while 21 year old Thunderbird netminder Noah Metivier turned away 34 of 38 shots in the Soo’s nineteenth loss of the season.
Soo coach Jamie Henderson told Saultsports that “it’s a struggle at the moment, and we just have to work our way out of it. This isn’t a situation where one or two players need to be better. As a group, we all need to decide if we want to be a playoff team, and that has to happen in a real hurry starting Saturday.”
The Thunderbirds continue their road trip when they meet Storm in Iroquois Falls on Saturday, January 25th with a 7:30 p.m start.
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