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| John Grant Jr won the Mann Cup with Peterborough the last time he appeared in one, in 2012. He's hoping Tuesday's Game 1 semifinal win was the first step towards one more. (Photo: Dave Fryer) |
Grant had 3 goals and 2 assists to lead
the Lakers to an 8-3 win. Taking the first game at home was extra
important to Peterborough since the next two games in the series will
be played in Oakville; the Memorial Centre is unavailable for the
the next week because of the annual Peterborough Exhibition.
The game was prefaced with an emotional
20-minute pregame ceremony during which the crowd of 2,724 gave Grant
three standing ovations. His parents, wife Raygen, daughter
Gabby and other family members were on the floor for the
ceremony. Long-time friend and teammate Tracey Kelusky spoke.
“When we were young we wanted to be the Gaits,” Kelusky said.
“Kids today want to be John Grant Jr.”
The Lakers presented Grant a framed
collage of photos from his legendary career with the team. National
team chairman Dean French was also on hand to present Grant a
framed Team Canada jersey. To conclude the ceremony, Grant addressed
the crowd. He finished up saying, “Now if you don't mind, I need to
wear this jersey for another month or so,” and ran to the
Peterborough bench to get ready to play.
A few minutes later, appropriately, he
got the Lakers on the board. Grant fought through a couple of
defenders and fired a bouncer. Nick Rose got some of it but
the ball dribbled across the goal line before Rose could spin and
stop it.
“I wanted it. Anyone who knows me
knows that stuffs important,” said Grant, who had almost scored
even earlier. “I hit a pipe the first shift; that would have been
good.”
The goal was the first of 5 points
including 3 goals for Grant, who said he was feeling great during the
game. “I don't know if it was adrenaline or what. I felt fairly
younger than I have in the last few games and I'm just happy I could
help the team win.”
Wesley Berg evened things up for
the Rock when he slapped the ball home hockey-style as the rebound of
an Andrew Kew shot rolled out of the crease. Brad Self
got that one back for Peterborough on a three on one break. He used
Chad Tutton as a decoy and ripped a shot just inside the left
post. Cory Vitarelli scored his first of two after Adam
Jones waited patiently with the ball on the power play before
feeding it to Vitarelli atop the crease.
That would be it for scoring for the
next 14 minutes. Both goalies, Rose for Oakville and Evan Kirk
for Peterborough, were sharp. As the game went on, Kirk had to be
occasionally spectacular to protect the Lakers' lead. He would wind
up making 61 saves in total.
Finally, almost nine minutes into the
second period, scoring resumed. Zach Currier stepped onto the
floor at one end of Peterborough's bench as a forward sprinted to the
other end. Currier timed his entry to the floor perfectly and turned
to put his body between a Rock player and the ball that was rolling
towards them. Under pressure, Currier tapped the ball along the floor
then ran onto it. He passed it to Grant, who shot around a screen to
make it 4-1.
Bradley Kri, who won nine of the game's
14 faceoffs for Oakville, took the next two and both led to Rock
goals. Glen Bryan barely avoided a crease call as he tucked one past
Kirk right off the draw. Then Jeremy Noble ripped home a step-back
shot to pull Oakville within a goal at 4-3.
About four minutes later, Vitarelli
gave Peterborough a little breathing room when he was left wide open
on a pick and roll. Then the goalies shut the doors for more than 20
minutes. Both sides had chances, but Rose and Kirk were the stars of
the game for that stretch. Kirk in particular was forced to make some
sensational saves that kept Oakville at bay in a game that could felt
closer than the final score indicated.
After the 13-minute mark of the third
period, Joel Matthews finally broke the goalies' spell when he
took a flip pass from Shawn Evans in the two-man game and
fired a high-to-high rope to make it 6-3.
While Grant is nearing the end of his
career, Evans is in the prime of his own legendary run with the
Lakers and he made another great pass to set up the next Peterborough
goal. With the ball near centre floor, Evans found a seam to rip a
pass to Mark Steenhuis, inexplicably unchecked near the net.
His goal at 14:57 felt like the dagger that finished off Oakville for
this game. Grant finished off the scoring with an empty-netter three
minutes from full time.
Kirk was pleased with the way the
Lakers improved after he thought they got away from what had made
them successful all season in the early going. “I thought we had a
shaky start. I thought we were a little complacent. We built habits
all year,” Kirk said, suggesting they got away from those habits in
the first period. “I think we changed in the second and third. We
got better as the game went on. That's what we're looking for.”
The goalie was happy with his play and
the handful of saves he made on high-quality Oakville chances, but
gave much of the credit to his defence for the majority of the 61
times he turned aside Rock shots. “They were big saves but my
defence made it easy work. They got in the lane and I saw the ball
really well. I just stood up and it was pretty easy, to tell the
truth.”
The Lakers defence did block several
shots, as they have gotten into the habit of doing. Robert Hope
absorbed a few in addition to putting on a clinic in how to kill a
4-on-3 power play. Playing low in Peterborough's inverted triangle,
Hope used his anticipation and lateral quickness to minimize
Oakville's chances in what is generally considered an almost
automatic goal situation against high-level offences.
Jeremy Noble did get one shot
away that was very close to making it 5-4 and potentially changing
the direction of the game during Oakville's 4-on-3 midway through the
third. The ball rang off one post and directly across the goal line
to ricochet away off the other.
The game was chippy from fairly early
on and grew more so as not much was being called and the players grew
frustrated. That side of the game is likely to only ramp up as the
series progresses. Oakville appeared to be trying to take the Lakers
out of their game with an aggressive style. Kirk said the Lakers are
prepared for that.
“It's going to be a long series.
They're a good team. That's why it's a four out of seven. They earned
the right to be here,” Kirk said. “It's going to be tough back
and forth. We talked about that. It's going to be a chippy series.
That's going to help us in the long run, just stay composed and we
have to give it back to them just as much as they give it to us.”
The key, he said, is to respond but to
be smart about it. “Team tough,” Kirk summarized. “All five
guys out there. You don't want to do anything stupid but just play
tough.”
Games 3 and 4 will be in Oakville this
Friday and next Monday before the series returns to Peterborough for
Game 4 next Thursday.
