The Blenheim Blades were looking to go 2-0 in their Provincial Junior Hockey
League Stobbs Division double round-robin Tier 2 playoff series when they
hosted the Petrolia Flyers Sunday night at the Blenheim Memorial Arena.
However the Flyers had other ideas and went home with a 3-1 victory.
All three teams – the Blades, the Flyers and the Dresden Kings – have each
won and lost a game with the round-robin half over. The rest of the games will
begin Thursday when the Blades travel to Petrolia for a 7:30 re-match, with the
Kings hosting Petrolia Friday, and the Blades at home to the Kings Sunday at 7
p.m.
The top two teams will then play a best-of-seven Stobbs Division Tier 2 final.
In Friday’s 4-3 overtime win over the Kings the Blades were short seven
regulars, while Sunday five were unavailable Tate Bowden, Sebastian
Stubberfield, Ryan Terry, Jared Delaey and Cameron Hazzard.
The Blades took a 1-0 lead 58 seconds into the second period when Ian
Campbell scored his second round-robin goal with assists going to Seth
Henderson and Alex Edwards.
Petrolia’s Daniel Gibson intercepted an errant Connor Wright pass deep in the
Blades zone at 16:25 of the period, and his shot beat Blenheim netminder Caleb
Pinsonneault to tie things at 1-1 after 40 minutes.
The third period belonged to the Flyers with Clay Dolbear scoring on a
powerplay at 1:49 after the Blades Evan Wells was whistled off for roughing two
seconds earlier.
Cole Hudson then iced the game for Petrolia when he scored at 13:40.
BLADES BITS: Petrolia outshot the Blades 36-26, including 30 to 14 during the
second and third periods…Blenheim’s Brett Wegrzyn and Petrolia’s Ethan Cran
were ejected for fighting with the game only 15 minutes and 11 seconds
old…During the regular season Blades players were only involved in four fights,
and there have already been two in the round-robin…The ice time sponsor was
Ridge Landfill Community Trust…Attendance was 415.