The fight was definitely there back home Sunday night at a jam- packed Sadlon Arena, but the Barrie Colts are down to their final breath in their OHL championship series against the Kitchener Rangers.
Dylan Edwards scored his second goal of the game at 5:24 of the second overtime to give the Rangers a 4-3 victory and put the Colts on the brink of elimination.
Kitchener now leads the best-of-seven series 3-0 and can complete the sweep and capture their first J. Ross Robertson Cup since 2008 on Tuesday night back in Barrie.
Game time is 7 p.m.
“I can tell you one thing, this group is not going to give up,” said Colts’ co-captain Kashawn Aitcheson, who for the second-straight game scored in the dying seconds to force overtime. “We got so much heart and so much care for one another. We’re going to fight until the last game.”
Overtime heartbreak is nothing new for the Colts in this series. Matthew Andonovski scored at 18:03 of the first extra frame to give the Rangers a similar 4-3 win in Game 2 on Friday.
A couple of different bounces their way, and it’s the Colts who might be up in the series.
“I would agree that it doesn’t feel like that for us either (down 3-0), but in saying that, that is the reality,” said Colts’ head coach Dylan Smoskowitz. “This team, we do our best work when our backs are against the wall, and all odds are against us.
“These guys, they stick together, or they find a way. I don’t see why it will be any different this time around.”
Edwards would end the fourth-longest OHL championship game (85:24) since 1998 when he jumped on a loose puck in front and jammed it under the pad of Barrie goaltender Ben Hrebik.
The former Erie Otters overage forward, who finished the night with four points, apparently was delivering on a request from his head coach.
After hitting the post in the first overtime, Jussi Ahokas told the sniper to “put the puck in, please.”
“The winning goal, that’s a playoff goal,” said Ahokas. “You get to the net, hard areas, and you win that battle, and that’s how you win hockey games.”
Kitchener is now a perfect 5-0 in overtime during this current playoff run.
“Our guys in there never had doubt,” said Edwards. “The team was ready to work every period.”
The puck had deflected right to Edwards in front.
“It’s playoff hockey,” said Smoskowitz. “It’s double overtime. They get a really good bounce, and I would have loved that bounce to go our way, but maybe in Game 4 we’ll get it.”
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For a second-straight game, the Colts denied the Rangers from pulling out a late victory.
Sam O’Reilly found a trailing Edwards, who was wide open in front, and he slid it past a helpless Hrebik to make it 3-2 with 1:12 remaining.
Aitcheson, though, had another big one-timer up his sleeve. Just two nights after sending it to overtime with 3.9 seconds remaining, the New York Islanders’ prospect took a feathered pass from Parker von Richter in his usual office at the top of the faceoff circle and drilled one over the right shoulder of Kitchener goalie Christian Kirsch to send the crowd of 4,256 into pandemonium.
“All 23 guys in the room are battling so hard right now,” said Aitcheson, who leads all defencemen with eight playoff goals and is tied with teammate Emil Hemming and O’Reilly for second in overall scoring with 27 points. “They’re sacrificing everything for the win.
“We feel we’re right there, and we just got to be where our feet are and take one day at a time.”
Like Game 2, the Rangers would put the late adversity aside to pull out the win.
“That’s hockey,” Ahokas. “Mistakes happen, and they scored, but we’ve been there before. It happened before, and that shows our team. The resilience. That we don’t give up. We don’t let things bother us, and we just keep going.”
O’Reilly, who had another big night with three points, opened the scoring late in the first, and it wasn’t until midway through the third that Barrie would even things up when Aitcheson found Hemming in the slot, and the Dallas Stars fired it home to extend his point streak to seven playoff games.
Carson Campbell would put the Rangers back on top 45 seconds later, but William Schneid, on a pretty individual effort where he deked around two defenders and beat Kirsch, tied it once again 35 seconds later.
The Colts, though, know now there’s no room for error. The good news, says Smoskowitz, is they’re familiar with being where they are now, and he believes his team took it to another level (Sunday) and will do it again in Game 4 on Tuesday night.
“There is some comfort knowing that we’ve been in that situation before,” said Smoskowitz, referring to Barrie’s comeback from a 3-1 deficit against the Brantford Bulldogs in the Eastern Conference Final. “The funny thing when you look back at the last series and how we approach our day-to-day routine when our backs are against the wall, and you know that one goal either way, there’s no tomorrow, they just came in with the exact same mentality, the exact same fun-loving attitude, but more importantly, the exact same purpose.
“You wouldn’t be able to tell that team is either up three (games) or down three. They go about their business the proper way.”
AITCHESON OFFERS FORMAL APOLOGY
Aitcheson took time to offer his personal apology to all those watching and the media after the “Nobody cares, work harder” comments after Game 7 against Brantford that went viral.
While Smoskowitz took all responsibility and blame for the awkward press conference, Aitcheson felt he had to say something.
“I’m my own person. I’m an adult. I want to formally apologize as well,” he said. “I know we didn’t want to talk about it again, but I just felt the need to apologize to each and every one of you as well, and I didn’t want him to take all the blame himself.”
Smoskowitz responded quickly. “But I deserved the blame,” he said. “He’s just that good of a human being.”
ICE CHIPS: The Rangers thought they had opened the scoring when O’Reilly connected on the power play at 13:56 of the first, but the goal was waived off after a review found the puck was touched by a high stick that should have had the play whistled dead. . . Kitchener outshot Barrie 50-39. . . The Colts went 0-for-3 on the power play, while the Rangers were 0-for-4. Barrie is just 1-for-9 with the man advantage in three games. . . Former Colts Kyle Clifford, Blaine Down, and Dalyn Wakely were all in attendance.
