Photo: Lori Bolliger/Hockey Canada Images
OAKVILLE, ON – The Winkler Flyers outshot the Miramichi Timberwolves 42-23 on Tuesday night in Oakville but ended up falling 3-2 in a shootout decision to close out their preliminary round schedule.
The Flyers controlled play for the majority of the 1st period and got rewarded for their efforts when Connor Jensen made a slick toe-drag move around the defender before finding the back of the net.
In the late stages of the 1st, the Flyers would be forced to kill a penalty that the Timberwolves would capitalize on with a deflection getting through Malachi Klassen to tie the game at 1-1. 23 seconds later, the Timberwolves took the lead off of what looked like an innocent shot on net that would give the MHL champions a 2-1 lead.
Things settled down in the second period and each team would get their chance on the powerplay. The Flyers were able to kill off the Timberwolves opportunity before they made the most of their own chance.
Dalton Andrew dropped a pass for Connor Jensen, who would step up and whistle in his second of the game off the post and in to tie it up at 2-2.
In the third, the Flyers controlled most of the play and had a number of chances in the opening ten minutes where they would outshoot Miramichi, 34-19 near the midway mark of the period.
For the second time at the Centennial Cup, the Flyers would head to overtime, this time with the Timberwolves. Winkler would open the overtime period on the powerplay but just couldn’t find the back of the net.
Overtime would solve nothing and the game would require a shootout where the Flyers would fall to the Timberwolves.
Winkler completes the preliminary round with a 2-0-0-2 record and will now await to see who they will play in the quarterfinal round on Friday.
