Five days after getting edge out in overtime the Bonnyville Jr. A Pontiacs exacted revenge by beating the Olds Grizzlys in a rematch on Friday night in Bonnyville.
The return of injured forward Ryan Piche sparked the Pontiacs to a 4-1 victory over the Grizzlys in front of a crowd of over 750 people at the RJ Lalonde Arena.
At 3:11 of the first period Piche broke into the Olds zone with speed and ripped a rocket of a slap shot off the crossbar and in for the first goal of the game.
“I just walked across the blue line and took a clapper and it happened to go in,” said Piche. “I was pretty excited about that with it being my first shift back. It was a huge confidence boost.”
Piche missed nine games after suffering an ACL injury on Oct. 23 in Calgary. Nov. 28 marked his first game back in the lineup for the Pontiacs, a lot sooner than the coaches were expected.
“It was good. My knee felt better than I thought it was going to,” said Piche. “I thought it was going to be in the back of my head a lot but it wasn't. It was pretty normal for the most part.”
Five minutes after the Piche opening goal Bonnyville defenseman Brinson Pasichnuk burst into the Olds zone and unleashed a slapper on the Grizzlys goal. Olds netminder Billy Gorn kicked out a juicy rebound into the slot, where it met Pontiacs forward Mitch Fritz, who deposited it into the back of the net for the games second goal.
“That is how you score goals at this level and above,” said Pontiacs head coach and Rick Swan.
“If you want gas you go to the gas station. If you want groceries you go to the grocery store. If you want goals you have to go to the net. Guys that have trouble scoring don't go to the net and the ones that do have success and score goals are prepared to go to the blue paint in front of the net.”
Fritz's ninth goal of the season put Bonnyville in front by a pair, a lead which they took right into the third period, although it didn't come without its challenges.
The Grizzly's best chance came at 14:53 of the second period when they had a 5-on-3 man advantage for a full two minutes.
Pontiac netminder Joey Desroiser came up big with the glove and the Bonnyville defenders cleared pucks from the goalmouth to help preserve the lead.
“The big different was that when Joey made the first save we were clearing rebounds. When (Gorn) was making the first save we were beating their guys to the net and capitalizing on them,” said Swan.
The Pontiacs added to their lead at 4:42 of the third when defenseman Mark Zvonkovic followed up a Chad Hurtibise wrist shot and beat Gorn.
Bonnnyville goaltender Joey Desrosiers made a series of great glove saves and stopped 24 of 25 shots he face. Forward Steen Pashichnuk found an empty net and Bonnyville paced their way to a decisive three goal win.
“We know that we are scoring enough and we like that part of our game,” said Swan. “We also like the resilience that we had as a team not to allow the momentum we had to go south when we get down. Those were two things that we wanted to have as a staple going forward.”
Swan and the rest of the Pontiacs coach staff hope the team can “bottle up” some of the play they had against Olds and take it into their next stretch of games.
Bonnyville is back in action on Dec. 2 (tonight) when they travel up Highway 63 to Fort McMuray. They will then come home for a pair of weekend contests.
The Spruce Grove Saints are in town on Friday, Dec. 5 and Drayton Valley rolls in for a Sunday afternoon tilt.
The Pontiacs currently sit in fifth place in the North Division with a 12-10-6 record and are five points back of Fort McMurray.
