Meteors battle back to even series
The Fort Erie Meteors turned the tables on the St. Catharines Rankin Construction Falcons Monday night.
The Meteors shook off a poor effort in Game 1 Saturday to defeat the Falcons 5-2 before 1,103 fans at the Seymour-Hannah Sports Complex to even their Greater Ontario Junior Hockey League best-of-seven semifinal playoff series 1-1.
“You never want to be down 2-0, especially against these guys,” Fort Erie associate coach Anthony Passero said. “They have some veteran guys and they’re well coached so going down 2-0 is not a good idea and you lose home ice.
“Coming in here and getting that back was huge. Just so proud of our group in how they bounced back. It was like two completely different teams within two days. It was fun to watch.”
Passero loved the Meteors commitment to win.
“We never crumbled,” Passero said. “We went up and then we got some power plays — our power play was good tonight — and then the game gets intense. They have some stars there and they come down your throat and if you crumble they’re going to eat you up and I just think we didn’t tonight.
“Charlie Burns was phenomenal (in goal) and it’s exactly what got us to this point.”
The Meteors collected a pair of goals with the man advantage as the Falcons were assessed 40 minutes in penalties compared to Fort Erie’s 18 minutes.
Passero admitted it’s not always easy — although crucial — for players to keep their cool under the duress of the playoffs.
“It’s a crazy line. It’s a playoff line and it’s how bad you want to win. It’s hard telling teenage kids to stop but we had it going all night,” he said.
Veteran Sam Tonelli scored just six minutes into the game, taking the pressure off the Mets following Saturday’s effort.
“We brought him in for a reason. I don’t think I loved his game Saturday night and challenged him tonight,” Passero said. “He gets down the ice 100 miles-per-hour and fires it in. It calms everyone down to score that first goal and it gets you into the game even more.”
Tonelli felt it crucial the Mets got off to a good start in enemy territory.
“It’s not even the goal that got me going. It’s that it got the team going, the first goal on the board and it felt great. It started the game off well and it ended well,” he said. “We were just focused on working hard. We knew Saturday night wasn’t our best night and if we bring our best game we will end up on top of most of these games we play against them and we did that tonight. We battled hard and we ended up on top.”
St. Catharines narrowed the gap to 3-2 early in the third but rookie Jaden Flora added a key insurance marker at 11:17 before Liam Beamish scored into an empty net at 15:25 to conclude the scoring.
“Jaden Flora is Liam Beamish’s best friend. Decided to throw them together and he pots one,” Passero said. “It’s just fun to watch them play together. I think they’ve been doing it for about 10 years and we finally got them together on a line and he got to bury one.”
Down the hall, St. Catharines general manager/coach Tyler Bielby was understandably annoyed and frustrated.
“I’m not happy about a lot of things, lack of discipline on our end . . . I don’t know. Anything else I’ll get in trouble but it’s playoff hockey,” he said. “I think there’s some really obvious penalties and then I think the rest, it’s tough for these kids to play now.”
Bielby feels it is crucial the Falcons turn the page.
“It’s a series, short-term memory and we have to move on past this and be ready to go on Wednesday,” he said. “Fort Erie clearly did that after their game, they came prepared. They came to win the discipline issue — they took undisciplined penalties tonight too and we got goals on them. We need to capitalize on them and stay out of the box.”
Falcon facts: Colin Ewing, Jordan Marconi, William Moore, Zach Mambella, Henry Attard and Marcus Harris were scratched for the Falcons . . . Owen Cressman, MacAllister Ward, Nolan Stickland and Ryan Robillard did not dress for the Meteors . . . Fort Erie head coach Nik Passero’s two-game suspension is over and he will be back behind the bench Wednesday . . . The Caledonia Corvairs lead the Hamilton Kilty B’s 2-0 in the other Golden Horseshoe semifinal. Game 3 goes Tuesday in Caledonia.
STATS PACK
Meteors 5 Falcons 2
Fort Erie forward Hunter Coley with a pair of goals.
St. Catharines Falcons: Tyler Hunt (6); Matthew Hlacar (4).
Fort Erie Meteors: Hunter Coley 2 (2, 3); Jaden Flora (3); Sam Tonelli (2); Liam Beamish (2).
Game stats: Power plays: St. Catharines 1/7, Fort Erie 2/8; Penalty minutes: St. Catharines 40; Fort Erie 18. The shots on goal were not correctly entered on the game sheet.
Attendance: 1,103
Up next: The Falcons head to Fort Erie Wednesday at 7 p.m. for Game 3.
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