Photos: Rob Fera – Points North Media
LIVELY, Ont. – Backed by another solid multi-point effort from defenceman Spencer Horgan, the Greater Sudbury Cubs went on to down the Kirkland Lake Gold Miners 6-1 Friday evening in Game 2 of their Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League series at T.M. Davies Arena.
Greater Sudbury now leads the best-of-seven series 2-0 heading into Game 3 Monday night at the Joe Mavrinac Community Complex in Kirkland Lake at 7 p.m. It will also be streamed live on FLOHockey.tv, the official broadcast partner of the NOJHL.
The Cubs kicked off the scoring eight and a half minutes into the first period when off a Gold Miners’ turnover, Briir Long set-up Mason Walker at the top of the crease and with his stick between his legs snapped the puck past goalkeeper Logan Coates.
Extending their lead early in the second stanza, Greater Sudbury’s Kaeden Long split the Kirkland Lake defence and darted in alone on a breakaway where he wired a shot past the blocker of Coates and into the left corner of the net.
More from the home side at 6:53, saw Noah Aboflan steer in a pass put his way by Eidan Macartney.
From there the fast-paced session saw the Cubs carry their 3-0 cushion into the intermission.
Finishing it off in the third, Lucas Antonioni took a feed across from Horgan while shorthanded and pumped a shot off the post and saw it trickle in.
Horgan now has points in each of his past 13 postseason contests, dating back to last year’s playoffs.
Another from Walker increased the lead to five just over a minute later as he tucked in a chance generated by Briir Long and Owen King.
As they did in Game 1, the Gold Miners broke the shutout bid of Iain Wintle in the late going, via the power play, as Isaiah set-up Daniel Rusu in the high slot where he roofed a shot through a crowd at 18:27.
Horgan then capped off the victory in the final minute off an nice end-to-end rush for the skilled NOJHL defenceman.
No. 1 Greater Sudbury Cubs vs. No. 8 Kirkland Lake Gold Miners
Game 1: Cubs 9, Gold Miners 1
Game 2: Cubs 6, Gold Miners 1
Game 3: Monday, March 23 @ Kirkland Lake 7 p.m. (Joe Mavrinac Community Complex)
Game 4: Tuesday, March 24 @ Kirkland Lake 7 p.m. (Joe Mavrinac Community Complex)
Game 5*: Thursday, March 26 @ Sudbury 7 p.m. (T.M. Davies Arena)
Game 6*: Saturday, March 28 @ Kirkland Lake 7 p.m. (Joe Mavrinac Community Complex)
Game 7*: Tuesday, March 31 @ Sudbury (T.M. Davies Arena)
*-if necessary
Greater Sudbury leads best-of-seven series 2-0
