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| Brad Self scored on a brilliant end to end run, including hurdling over a falling Chiefs defender, as part of Peterborough's opening 7-0 run. (Photo: Tim Prothero) |
In any tight, hard-fought series,
there's bound to be at least one blowout. Even considering that,
Thursday night's 15-9 win by the Peterborough Lakers to take a 3-0
lead in the Major Series Lacrosse finals over the Six Nations Chiefs
was stunning.
Shawn Evans started the
onslaught at 2:18. When Josh Currier connected just under 11
minutes later the scoreboard read 7-0 in the Lakers favour and for
all intents and purposes, the game was over.
Six Nations fought hard to get back
into the game but were never able to close the gap to fewer than five
goals because Peterborough kept playing hard, knowing how dangerous
the Chiefs can be. Six Nations twice scored three straight goals but
each time, the Lakers responded.
One play could symbolize how the night
went for each of the teams. Six Nations had just run off three goals
to close the gap to 13-8 with 5:47 to play. Peterborough had the ball
in the offensive zone when a Chiefs defender stripped the ball from
rookie forward Holden Cattoni, who lost his stick in the
process. Cattoni spun away towards the ball, ran around it and kicked
the ball straight into the stick of teammate Cory Vitarelli,
in stride and right in the mesh.
When Vitarelli fired a shot home, it
showed that it was the kind of night where even when the Chiefs did
things well it just didn't seem to work out for them.
Perhaps even worse than the score for
Six Nations was that they may have lost yet another star player to
injury. Dhane Smith went down with what appeared to be a sore
knee while no one was touching him, which generally isn't a good
sign. He had to be helped to the dressing room.
Austin Staats also left the game
for a while after a crushing hit from Zach Currier dropped him
to the ground. Staats eventually was able to get up and walk off
under his own power but his right arm was hanging awkwardly. He did
return to action later in the game.
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| Steenhuis had 5 goals & 4 assists to lead all scorers. (Photo: Tim Prothero) |
Mark Steenhuis led Peterborough
with 5 goals and 4 assists, John Grant Jr had a goal and 5
assists and seven other Lakers scored at least 3 points. Dan
Dawson had 4 goals for Six Nations and Randy Staats a goal
and 3 assists.
“It's funny. Sometimes the shots go
in, sometimes they don't,” said Steenhuis. “Tonight it seemed
like it was easier to get our shots on net and we were putting them
in the right spots. They've got a great defensive team over there,
they've got a great goalie in net. The bounces just went our way
tonight.”
Steenhuis was pleased that the Lakers
didn't take their collective foot off the gas pedal and let the
Chiefs back into the game.
“I think you're just looking over at
their bench and the players they have, how talented they are. You
can't really start smiling and laughing on the bench because three or
four shots they can get three or four goals real quick and all of a
sudden they're right back in the game,” Steenhuis said. “I know
we were up by a lot and sometimes you kind of ease up and it's a
little less stressful on the bench. Everyone kept their heads, kept
going the right way, doing the right things, saying the right things,
playing the right way, which is the most important.”
He expressed plenty of respect for the
players in the back end, especially Peterborough's youngsters. “These
young guys on this team, you can't say enough about them They're
swarming that ball on every draw, working their tails off. Our D, our
goaltending's been unbelievable all three games. It was really nice
for our offence to step up and put a few more balls in the net and
take some tension off them in the back. I've never seen so many
blocked shots, shots hitting sticks. It's been remarkable watching
those guys play.”
From the Chiefs perspective, they got
off on the wrong foot and simply weren't able to recover. “We came
out flat, they came out flying,” said Chiefs head coach Rich
Kilgour. “We never erased that seven-goal lead. We made a couple of
nice, two goals in a row there, but could never get over the hump and
really get it to a workable margin. Those kind of games happen once
in a while, it's just too bad it happened tonight.”
Losing Smith was just another blow to a
team that is already missing Cody Jamieson, Jordan Durston
and Johnny Powless. “He looked pretty tender going off
there,” Kilgour said of Smith. “It seems the way, when it rains
it pours. We've got other guys going down and then Dhane Smith. It's
tough, losing three of your top probably five offensive players. No
excuses, though, we've got enough talent to win a game without them
and that's what we're going to have to do.”
Kilgour was unhappy that six of his
players were sent off the floor after receiving 10-minute misconducts
in the final 3:05.
“He's kicking everyone out at the end
of the game. I'm not trying to complain but I've been up here when
we're up three or four goals at the end and Peterborough gets a
little out of hand and no one ever gets kicked out and no one gets
anything,” Kilgour said. “He's kicking Jeremy Thompson
out. The guy doesn't say two words in his career ever and somehow he
gets tossed. I'm not even going to try to say the refs had any effect
on that game. I just don't like at the end kicking everyone out,
handing out [misconducts] like candy.”
Much of the Six Nations vitriol at the
end of the game grew out of Zach Currier's hit on Austin Staats.
Staats was trying to pick up a loose ball as Currier ran towards him
and Currier finished his check with a textbook shoulder to shoulder
hit. Replays clearly showed that Currier took just one step after
Staats had missed picking up the ball and Currier may not even have
seen that Staats didn't have it.
In real time, though, the Chiefs just
saw their player getting flattened while the ball bounced away off
his shin and Staats taking a long time to get up. Add that to a game
that clearly went sideways early on them, and the frustration is
hardly surprising.
For his part, Currier said he had no
ill intent towards Staats. “I was just going hard. I'm going for
the ball and the hit was there so I took it,” Currier said. “It's
not like I was trying to hurt the guy or trying to get a cheap shot
on him. I hit him as hard as I could and tried to get a clean hit on
him and then I guess they just didn't like that. I'm not complaining
that they're coming after me. They've got to switch something up,
down three-nothing in the series. It's a good sign for me that I'm
getting under their skin.”
Things blew up a bit at the end when
Staats knocked down Lakers goalie Evan Kirk and Currier, who
happened to be the nearest Laker, started to run after Staats. He was
cut off by Dan Dawson, who grabbed Currier by the head, tackled him
to the ground and ripped his helmet off.
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Brier Jonathan & the Chiefs will have their eyes on getting their first win of
the series Sunday in Six Nations. (Photo: Tim Prothero)
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Billy Dee Smith received a
5-minute major for throwing an elbow that just missed Josh Currier's
head. Thompson actually received a misconduct and was sent off the
floor but didn't realize it and returned to take a faceoff after
Craig Point had scored a shorthanded goal. It was just a
result of the confusion through the final minutes of the game.
No supplementary discipline is
expected, although Smith just avoided getting a multi-game
suspension. Two misconducts within five games would result in a
three-game ban, but Smith's previous misconduct, earned in the semis
against Brooklin, came five games previously, so he will be available
for Game 4 on Sunday.
Josh Currier said that game will be
important for the Lakers because they know it will only get harder to
close out the series if the Chiefs start to rebound. “We haven't
won anything yet. Our mentality was to keep pushing,” Currier said.
“Even being up three games to nothing, we haven't won anything.
We're just going to keep pushing until we've got four games.”
They'll have that chance back at the
ILA Sunday at 8 pm in a game you can watch via JVI
Sports Network's free live webcast.
