A pair of wins, beginning with a 3-1 victory in Spencerville on Wednesday, January 21, followed by 6-2 win on home ice against the first place Kemptville #1 Panthers in Morrisburg, Sunday, helped the South Dundas Atom B Lions to leapfrog into first place by one point.
The Lions now have three regular season games left while the Panthers have five.
The Lions dominated the play in both of their recent wins.
In Spencerville last Wednesday, Rangers goalie Bryce Kijewski kept the game close as he made save after save against the Lions attack. He was most impressive when he stopped Sam Connors on a clear cut breakaway with 5:40 left in the first period.
The Lions finally got one behind him with 13 seconds left in the opening period, when Cam Shaver passed it to Dryden Buter who fired the shot.
Kijewski made the initial save but James Martens was there waiting to put the rebound away with a powerful wrist shot for a 1-0 Lions lead.
The line struck again early in the second period when Martens setup Shaver, but the Rangers pulled within one late in the frame with an unassisted Hayden Walker counter.
The period ended with the Lions only up 2-1 despite heavily out-shooting the Rangers for two periods.
The Lions stretched it to 3-1 early in the third period when Shaver centered the puck to Buter and that is the way it remained.
The Lions had a strong work ethic all night, winning puck battles and pressuring the Rangers at both ends of the ice.
James Martens had an excellent game releasing some powerful shots and being strong on the puck.
The win pulled the Lions to within a point of first place Kemptville #1, who they would host on Sunday.
Heading into Sunday’s game, the Lions talked about taking the game to the Panthers and outworking them.
Just 19 seconds in, the Lions hit a little speed bump when a Storm Briggs shot fooled Quade Mullin, and the Panthers went up 1-0.
The Lions quickly regrouped and replied with three goals in under a minute.
The first was a beauty when Nate Paulino made a long stretch pass from inside his blue line to a streaking Monty Dejong at centre. The pass was perfect as Dejong took it in stride, went in and slid the puck past Jordan Zlomislic.
Fifteen seconds after that Sean Nicolaassen banged home a loose puck to make it 2-1, with Buter providing the assist.
Then before the cheering Lions crowd could sit down it was 3-1. This one only took 13 seconds, when Buter slid it to Connors who sent his patented wrist shot to the upper right corner past a stunned Zlomislic.
The opening period was a wild one that ended 3-1 in the Lions favour.
The Lions opened the second period on their power play and at 8:31 they capitalized.
Paulino let go a shot from the point that hit a crowd in front, and Spencer Barclay used his backhand to slide the puck past Zlomislic.
This time it was the Panthers who countered quickly, with a Connor Arcand goal to cut the Lions advantage to 4-2.
Late in the period, on the Lions power play, Buter finished off a pretty passing play with Nicolaassen and Connors. for a 5-2 Lions lead heading into the third period.
Early in the third, Dejong was the recipient of another stretch pass, this time it came from Jack McCann to make it 6-2.
Mullin made some key saves throughout the game to keep his team in command.
Two of the Lions even put their soccer skills to use. Mullin headed a wrist shot into the corner, while on another play McCann lost his stick and used some fancy foot work to kick the puck to his teammate who took it from harms way.
The Lions specialty teams were key as they went 2 for 3 on the power play and 3 for 3 on the penalty kill.
It was also the second game in a row that the Lions had thoroughly outworked their opponent.
The South Dundas Atom B Lions next game will be at home on Sunday at 4 p.m. versus Smiths Falls when they will provide some great pre-Super Bowl action.
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