Royals’ Comeback Falls Short, Canadians Even Series At 1-1
The Carleton Place Canadians have evened their best-of-seven Eastern Ontario Junior Hockey League series with the Richmond Royals at one game apiece.
The Canadians scored three first period goals and hung on for a 6-4 win over the Royals Sunday night in Richmond. The Royals had won seven straight games heading into Sunday night’s clash.
Hunter Robitaille, Gabriel Bergeron and Ethan Colley scored in the first period for the Canadians, giving them a 3-0 lead 11:30 into the game. After the third goal, the Royals replaced starting goalie Ethan Dinsdale with Sam Nolan. Because of the schedule of the series, with four games in five nights, both teams are expected to give both goalies work.
In the second period, it took less than a minute for the Royals to get back into the game. Tyler Hames scored 11 seconds into the period from Tyler Branchaud. Just 17 seconds later, Dylan Rorwick scored from Branchaud and Evan Burgess to make the score 3-2.
Rorwick’s goal was his EOJHL playoff-leading 13th in 11 games.
Carleton Place got the two goals back later in the period, with Finn Barton scoring an unassisted goal and Joe Devlin scoring on the power play late in the period to make the score 5-2.
The Royals scored another pair of goals early in the third to make the score 5-4. Sam McElheran scored from Jackson Dallaire and Cameron Donaldson, and then Parker Stretch scored from Leo Kluchert.
While Richmond peppered Carleton Place goalie Charlie Larocque with shots in the third period, as they did in the second, they could not put the equalizer past him. Richmond took two ill-timed roughing penalties midway through the period, and Carleton Place capitalized as Finn Barton scored a power play goal to make the score 6-4.
Richmond outshot Carleton Place 51-36. Larocque made 47 saves for the win.
Game 3 will be played Tuesday night in Carleton Place while Game 4 will be played Wednesday night in Richmond with an 8:20 p.m. face off.
