GALLERY: Rock bounce Red Wings

TIMMINS, Ont. – After giving up an early goal, the Timmins Rock stormed back to blitz the Elliot Lake Red Wings 9-1 in a Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League contest Friday in front of nearly 800 fanes at McIntyre Arena.

Elliot Lake spotted an opening and took advantage for the night’s initial marker as Ethan Mercer’s long stretch found Alex Antoine darting through the Rock defence where he went in alone and cut to his left where he tucked one past Timmins netminder Jacob Brown, five and a half minutes into the match-up.

After dominating most of the period, the Rock were finally rewarded on the power play at 14:57 where Kyle Trottier slammed in a rebound into the open side off a Nicolas Pigeon attempt.

The assist for Pigeon sees him run a consecutive game point streak to 14 in succession.

Building on that, the hosts went in front for good when Christophe Petit snapped one into an empty net from the right point after Red Wings’ goalkeeper Cameron Smith lost an edge and slid clear while looking to get across his crease, which prevented him from having a chance to make a save.

Another man advantage effort made it 3-1 Rock thanks to Ethan Pool firing one by a sprawling Smith at 18:30.

Breaking it open in the middle stanza, Timmins tacked on two more to go up by four with still half a game to play.

Nolan Ring had a third extra-man effort for the hosts at 3:15 where he went top shelf and finished off a Justin Charette feed from down low.

Pigeon then followed that by potting his 20th of the season as he stayed patient while driving to the net and darted around it and saw him completed his wrap around.

Yan Bessette then made it 6-1 as he took it wide on a three-on-two and slid in a low effort along the ice to put the Rock up by five after 40 minutes.

Finishing it off in the final frame, with three more, Timmins won going away as Thomas Beard, Pigeon and Ian Lachance’s initial NOJHL goal conclude the result.

Beard got his by winning a race for the puck down the wing, then ripping one upstairs.

As for Pigeon, he scored once more by banking a shot off the skate on an Elliot Lake defender during an extra-man effort.

Meanwhile, Lachance’s tally saw him face nothing but open net from a couple of feet away to deposit his initial league effort, which rounded out the scoring.

Timmins moves to 39-7-3-2 with the triumph while the Red Wings dropped to 14-32-1-2.


Game Photos:
Thomas Perry – 
The Daily Press/Postmedia Network