Having twice blown leads, the Barrie Colts headed to the second intermission Friday night at the Meridian Centre locked in a 3-3 tie with the Niagara IceDogs.
Marty Williamson didn’t hold back.
“I told them that I just hate dumb teams, and I thought we were a dumb team taking penalties and some of the turnovers we had,” the Colts general manager and head coach said in letting his team have it. “That was my thing to them. Are we going to be a dumb team again and lose this game on the road, or are we going to smarten up?”
With four goals in the first six minutes of the third period and a dominating finish to a 7-3 win, Williamson had his answer.
“We played a smart period,” said Williamson, whose club outshot Niagara 15-7 in the final frame. “My comment to them after the game was ‘Think how good we can be if we play 60 minutes.’ But give (Niagara) credit, they didn’t give up. They kept pushing back.
“We kind of helped them, but they kept pushing back and give our guys credit for playing a good third period on the road.”
Cole Beaudoin, with his second of the game, scored the game-winner just a minute into the third and the Colts never looked.
“The guys came together at the start of the third,” said Beaudoin. “Marty got us going there, so it was really good to see the guys come out in the third and push hard and score some goals to win the game.
“That was definitely nice to see.”
Carter Lowe, Riley Patterson, Beau Jelsma, with his second of the game, completed the offensive explosion for Barrie (9-4).
“I know our captain (Jelsma) said a few words too,” said Williamson, whose club is now 8-2 over its last 10 games. “We weren’t happy up to two periods, so there was a lot of us grumbling. We came out and we responded the right way.”
Beau Akey had a goal and three assists in helping the Colts close the gap to just two points behind the IceDogs (10-4), who are off to a surprising start atop both the Central Division and Eastern Conference standings.
Mason Wray, Ryan Roobroeck, and Andrew Wycisk scored for Niagara, which fought back from 1-0 and 3-1 deficits before Barrie put it away.
“We got to show the teams around the league that we’re a team that teams can’t take us lightly,” said Beaudoin, who along with his teammates will wrap a short road trip Saturday night against the Erie Otters. “Being a top team like Niagara, it shows (other teams) that they shouldn’t mess with us.
“We’re just going to keep pushing. It’s going to be a tough game against Erie. They beat us last week (2-1), so we need to push hard and play a full 60 minutes.”
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Akey scored just 1:30 into the game, before Wray buried a rebound in front past Sam Hillebrandt with just 57 seconds left in the first.
Power-play markers by Jelsma and Beaudoin to start the second put Barrie on top 3-1, but Roobroeck, on the power play, and Wycisk, late in the period, tied it again.
“Back-end passes, just dumb stuff,” Williamson said of his team’s sloppy play. “As I told them, I can handle losing, I can handle some tough calls that went against us. That kind of stuff is part of hockey but making some careless plays and not caring enough to get it over the blueline, these kinds of things just can’t creep into our game.
“I thought our guys put a stop to it in the third period.”
The Colts found themselves without a full lineup and having to juggle lines again heading into this one. Dalyn Wakely will miss at least the weekend after suffering an ankle injury.
“We don’t know, it was just a freak accident,” Williamson said when asked how long Wakely is out. “His ankle was really swollen up. We’ll know more if it’s a couple of weeks. I don’t think we’re looking at long-term. He might need a couple of weeks, I’m not sure.”
Beaudoin isn’t still 100 percent after illness and an ear infection kept him out of the last two games.
“I thought he was a warrior,” Williamson said of Beaudoin’s effort Friday. “He’s still under the weather, but he played for us and played great.”
Beaudoin said he was just trying to do what he could to help the team out.
“I was just trying to battle through it,” he said. “I love being out there with the guys and helping everyone out, so anything I can do to help the team come out on top and get the two points I’m going to do.
“I was just trying to keep battling through.”
Barrie will look to sweep the road trip and avenge a tough loss at home to the Otters last week in Pennsylvania tonight.
“We talked about this last practice. If we want to be a first-place team, then each of the games on the road trip we got to kind of hopefully have success,” said Williamson. “We got the first one, now we got to go and try to get the second one.
“We kind of owe them a little bit, but they’re playing awfully well. I see they won again tonight (4-3 in Brantford). Erie will be a tough game.”
Game time at the Erie Insurance Arena is 7 p.m.
ICE CHIPS:
Zach Wigle had three assists. Lowe also had two assists for a three-point night. “I thought Carter played a good game for me and gave me some real plays,” said Williamson. The coach also praised defenceman Grayson Tiller’s play. “Tiller was really strong for us on the back end,” added the coach. Hillebrandt made 25 saves for the Colts. . . The Colts outshot the IceDogs, 34-28. . . Bode Stewart had a beautiful assist on Jelsma’s first goal, spinning around in front of the net before backhanding it to the captain for the easy tap-in. . . The game marked the first time defencemen Jack Brauti and Blair Scott faced the Colts since their trade before the season to Niagara. . . Barrie held Kevin He (11-10-21), one of the OHL’s top scorers, pointless.
