Photos: VoodoosHockey.com
POWASSAN, Ont. – A physical, hard-fought affair Friday saw the streaking Greater Sudbury Cubs win their ninth straight game in defeating the Powassan Voodoos 4-1 in a battle between two of the top Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League clubs, held at the Powassan Sportsplex.
Picking up an early power play, the Cubs went right to work as the puck found its way to Greater Sudbury defenceman Kyloe Ellis, who moved in from the left point and fired a shot, from the slot, past the blocker of Voodoos’ starter Daniel Dirracolo, 1:38 into the match-up.
Heading to the second stanza, Powassan drew level at 2:15 when Ryan Patrick lifted in a backhand off a goal-mouth scramble over a sprawled Noah Metivier in the Cubs net.
Regrouping, the visitors came back to retake the lead six and a half minutes later as Cameron Shanks corralled a loose puck at the top of the crease off a Nicholas Toffoli point shot and pulled it to his right where he tucked it past Dirracolo.
Greater Sudbury then took a 3-1 lead to the second intermission thanks to Pierson Sobush, who coming off a four-goal night Thursday, finished off an Ellis pass at 15:51 to give him eight tallies in his past five contests.
In the third, the guests put the game away in the late going as Oliver Smith ran a point streak to seven in succession as he came over the Voodoos blueline and slid a low shot into an empty net after the Voodoos had pulled their goalkeeper for an extra attacker.
With the outcome the Cubs continued their winning ways and raised their overall record to 25-4-2-0.
With the loss, Powassan fell to 19-8-1-0 on the season.
