The Barrie Colts’ 11-game win streak came to an end Saturday night at WFCU Centre in Windsor.
A bad second period and barely better third resulted in a 3-0 defeat to the host Spitfires, who dealt Barrie its first loss since a 7-1 drubbing from the Bulldogs on January 25th in Brantford.
“Obviously, it’s not the result we wanted,” said Colts forward Ben Wilmott. “We had a good start to the game, and I think we just got away from our game a little bit in the second and third. It’s a good team over there, and we battled hard, but it’s just not the result we wanted tonight.”
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After a dominant, physical, scoreless first period where the Colts (41-12-2-4) outshot the Spitfires 11-7 and hemmed them in their own zone the majority of the time, the host team flipped the script big time in the second.
AJ Spellacy, shorthanded, and Ethan Belchetz, on a five-on-three, scored for the Spitfires (39-14-5-2), who outshot the Colts 16-3 and never looked back.
“I really don’t know why the game plan changed after the first period to the second,” said Colts head coach Dylan Smoskowitz. “I thought we had a really good first period. We came into the coach's office, and we were pretty happy. It was a good road period for us, and we were playing the way we wanted to play. Dictating the pace of the game.
“Then puck management, some long shifts, and just some softer play really fueled them.”
Spellacy opened the scoring at 5:46 when he raced into the Barrie end and ripped a shot over the left shoulder of Ben Hrebik that bounced off the back bar and out so quickly that play continued. A video review, a couple of minutes later, clearly showed it went in.
Struggling, the Colts ran into penalty trouble less than six minutes later. With Mason Zebeski already heading off for tripping, Justin Handsor drew an unsportsmanlike conduct call, giving Windsor a two-man advantage for a full two minutes.
Belchetz made the Colts pay when he hammered a one-timer from the top of the faceoff circle over the left shoulder of Hrebik with one second left on the 5-on-3.
“You take a dumb penalty to make it five-on-three,” said Smoskowitz. “You almost kill the five-on-three, so it’s almost like you feel really good about it as a momentum builder. But even before that penalty, I had to call a timeout because I just couldn’t watch it anymore.
“We were not playing Barrie Colts hockey. There’s going to be a lot of video clips, and a lot of conversations this week to correct the mistakes of tonight.”
Things weren’t much better in the third for the Colts, who could get little going. Liam Greentree scored an empty net goal with 2:12 remaining to seal the win for Windsor, which outshot Barrie 30-10 over the final 40 minutes.
“I didn’t like a couple of our penalties tonight, but, again, nothing happens if we’re playing our proper hockey,” said Smoskowitz. “You probably have more offensive-zone time. You probably continue to put them on their heels. They’re the ones taking penalties on us, but when we don’t stick to our structure, we don’t stick to our identity, we try to be something we’re not, you’re going to run into trouble.
“When you’re facing a strong opponent, like Windsor, they’re going to take it to you, and they took it to us tonight.”
Wilmott said he and his teammates need to pick themselves back up and take what they can from the loss.
Michael Newlove stopped all 21 shots he faced as the Colts were held off the scoresheet for just the third time this season.
“Unfortunately, we just couldn’t bury one ourselves, and hopefully we’ll learn from this,” said Wilmott. “Learn to stay a little bit more disciplined and keep the details fine too.”
UP NEXT
The Colts look to bounce back on the road Wednesday morning when they take on the Brampton Steelheads in a school day game.
“We’ve proven to everyone that we can build off some good wins and keep the momentum riding through, which is a positive thing as well, but we haven’t had many opportunities to respond after a loss like this,” said Smoskowitz. “I liked the response after the last loss to Brantford. I thought we responded really well. You start a new win streak like that. We have an opportunity on Wednesday morning in Brampton to respond after this loss with two good days of practice.”
Meanwhile, the Spitfires head to Flint on Saturday for the first of two straight games against fellow Western Conference contenders.
ICE CHIPS
Joe Salandra (illness) sat out for a second game. Carter Lowe can return on Wednesday after completing a two-game suspension. Luc Gauvreau, who was suspended for three games, can return Thursday.
Barrie’s power-play has gone 0-for-15 over the last five games to drop to fourth overall (.258).
A melee broke out after Greentree’s empty net goal when he and Kashawn Aitcheson got tangled up. Spellacy and von Richer fought, while Wilmott and Aitcheson were handed unsportsmanlike penalties. Anthony Cristoforo and Jack Nesbitt were also sent to the dressing room early. “Probably emotions got the best of everyone at the end of it,” said Smoskowitz. “It was very high on their end and pretty low on our end, and it resulted in a little bit of a melee at the end. No major penalties, so we’re pretty happy about that.”
Greentree’s two points on Saturday put him in second all-time among Spitfires scorers.
ADD. OHL
London 5 Brampton 0
Owen Sound 5 Erie 4 (SO)
Flint 4 Ottawa 3 (SO)
Saginaw 5 Peterborough 2
