A shorthanded Pelham Panthers squad came out with a massive victory in the biggest game of the season so far Thursday night in Brantford. The Panthers, who overcame adversity throughout the contest, skated to a 6-3 win over the Brantford Titans (9-17-2-0) to leapfrog the Titans for the last playoff spot in the Eastern Conference and improve to 8-14-5-0 on the season.
After the Panthers successfully killed off an early penalty, it was Evan Norris who opened the scoring with an unassisted marker at 5:27 for his first goal as a Panther. Later in the period, it was Norris again who beat Brantford netminder Ben Rossi on the powerplay to open up a 2 goal lead for the Panthers. The Panthers would run into penalty trouble at the end of the period taking 3 infractions inside of the final 2 minutes leading to an extended 5-on-3 for the Titans going into the second. It would be 23 seconds into the second frame for the Titans to convert their first powerplay goal to make it a one goal game. Then just a little over a minute later the Titans would find the back of the net again at 1:39 to tie the game at 2. A little later in the period, a Nathan Pratt-Vallier shot would deflect off a Brantford player in front and land on the stick of Mason Goodfellow who would beat Rossi to make it a 3-2 game. However, the Titans would respond again towards the end of the period tying things up at 3 a piece at 15:32. The Panthers would kill off one Brantford penalty in the dying minutes of the second before another penalty at the end of the period would see the Titans go to another powerplay to open the 3rd. Instead, it was Panthers captain Caleb MacLeish who picked up a loose puck behind the Titans net and buried the wrap-around attempt for an unassisted short handed goal at 1:39. A little under 3 minutes later, it was Nicholas Gilby who buried a rebound to beat Rossi at 4:29 to put the Panthers up 5-3. The Panthers would once again play an effective shut down game in the third with the lead killing off a pair of penalties and only allowing 7 3rd period shots. Finally, it was Owen Hunks who would seal the deal with an empty net goal at 19:22.
The Panthers, who have now picked up 5 of the last possible 6 points, will look to ride their wave of recent success into this weekend’s pair of games. The Panthers will travel to Port Colborne Saturday night at 7:30 for a matchup against the Sailors at the Vale Centre, before returning home to the Meridian Community Centre on Sunday for a 2:45pm battle with the Fort Erie Meteors.
