Timmins Rock forward Thomas Beard goes down on one knee as he drills a wrist shot past Blind River Beavers goalie Connor Dunham-Fox for his seventh goal of the season with 8.8 seconds remaining in the first period of Sunday afternoon’s NOJHL contest at the McIntyre Arena. The power play marker gave the Rock a 5-1 lead in a contest they would go on to win 9-1. THOMAS PERRY/THE DAILY PRESS jpg, TD, apsmc
The Timmins Rock scored early and often en route to a 9-1 victory over the Blind River Beavers at the McIntyre Arena Sunday afternoon.
Thomas Perry
The Daily Press/Postmedia Network
It was the seventh-straight victory for the Rock (17-7-0-0), who sit in third place in the NOJHL standings — one point back of the Hearst Lumberjacks (17-6-0-1), whom they defeated 3-2 at the McIntyre Arena Friday night, and three points up on the Beavers (15-9-1-0).
Blue-liner Braedyn Cyr got the puck rolling for the Rock when he scored the first of his two markers on the afternoon and third of the season 51 seconds into the contest.
“I saw that the puck was in the neutral zone and nobody was going after it, so I was coming down with speed and decided to pick it up and take it wide and I kind of fumbled it a little bit and it trickled in,” he said.
“I got lucky, but it was good to get the scoring started.
That unassisted goal touched off the Rock’s Toque and Mitt Toss, with fans tossing the winter items onto the ice so they could be donated to Living Space and other organizations that assist the homeless.
Cyr kept things rolling when he added a power-play marker, his fourth tally of the campaign, just over two minutes later.”
“We were on the power play, so we got things set up and (Lucas) Lowe made a play and (Nolan) Hendry picked it up and got it to me and I had a wide-open shot to finish the play and I put the puck in the top right corner,” he said.
The Beavers responded with a power-play marker of their own, Aaron Dukeshire’s 10th goal of the season to cut the Rock lead in half.
But the Rock got that one back seven minutes later when Jack Kelly scored the first of his two goals on the afternoon and 10th of the season, also a power-play marker.
And 18 seconds later, Henry McLellan followed with his seventh goal of the campaign.
The real backbreaker, however, was Thomas Beard’s power-play marker, his seventh goal of the season, with just 8.8 seconds remaining in the opening period.
It allowed the Rock to take a 5-1 lead into the dressing room for the first intermission.
Things went from bad to worse for the Beavers, as starting goalie Connor Dunham-Fox was unable to answer the bell to open the second period, with affiliate player Jaret Fenton-Chypyha, of the GNU18L’s Timmins Majors coming on in relief.
It appeared Dunham-Fox may have suffered a lower-body injury late in the opening period, but he was able to continue until the buzzer sounded to end the frame.
Fenton-Chypyha was able to hold the Rock to one power-play marker, Alexis Tremblay’s sixth goal of the campaign, in the middle frame.
Up 6-1 to start the third period, the Rock once again turned up the offence and added three more goals to put things out of reach.
Kelly added his second goal of the game and 11th of the season early in the frame.
Clark Scaddan followed with his sixth tally of the campaign and Travis Poan closed out the scoring when he netted a shorthanded marker, also his sixth goal of the season.
Cyr feels the Rock have been playing with a lot more confidence since they began their current seven-game winning streak.
“We are definitely a lot more dialed in when it comes to our systems and we have the mindset that we are the best team in the league,” he said.
“Everybody comes in and tries to beat us, it’s not the other way around. We want to go out there and play our game.”
The blue-liner acknowledged the Rock remained focused on playing sound defence even when the score became one-sided.
“We want to play a full 60 minutes every game and I think that’s what we did this afternoon,” he said.
Cyr was paired with Ethan Albert for Sunday’s contest and the duo looked solid in all three zones.
“Ever since we started playing together, we have been clicking and we are hoping to keep things rolling,” Cyr said.
While Rock coach and general manager Brandon Perry was happy with the four points his squad earned on the weekend, he was even more pleased with how they played in both games.
“I really liked both of our games this weekend, against two really good opponents, well-coached teams,” he said. “It was just a really good effort out of our group.
“Obviously, our power play gave us four goals today, which gave us the momentum. We came out really hard and our forecheck was really good, our attention to detail was really good and we caught them sleeping a little bit on the back end of a three (games) in three (days).
“Our penalty kill has been good all year and we have been really good on the kill. Even in the third period this afternoon we got a lot of practice but we did a great job. Our power play has been the issue this season in terms of special teams.”
Given the score, it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise that a number of Rock players made favourable impressions Sunday afternoon.
“Reece Liu has been fantastic all season, he gives us so much energy and rarely takes a night off,” Perry said.
“He is such a smart player, with the highest IQ you can find in a hockey player. He makes the right reads and there is no better player in our team off the net cycle. He just does things right and works hard every single night.
“It was super nice to see Kells (Kelly) get a couple of goals. I am probably harder on Kells than a lot of guys in this lineup because I am typically harder on 20 year olds in the lineup who wear letters for us when things aren’t going well and things weren’t going well for a month a half for us and he was taking a lot of that, but he shows up to the rink and he gives us an honest effort. He is a great kid and I was super happy to see him get rewarded this afternoon.
“When Braedyn Cyr is playing his best game, he is hard to stop. He is a really good player. He is dynamic, with great offensive instincts. Defensively, he plays hard, he is big, he is heavy and he has got a heavy shot.
“Dryden Riley has been our best player here the last five or six games. Him and (goalie) Graham (Gee) have been great, probably the biggest reason we are on a seven-game heater right now.”
Riley stopped 27 of the 28 shots he faced to earn his 12th win of the season.
Dunham-Fox, who turned aside 14 of the 19 shots the Rock directed his way in his 20 minutes of action, was tagged with the loss. Fenton-Chypyha blocked 13 of the 17 shots he faced in his 40 minutes of relief.
ROCK 3 LUMBERJACKS 2
Blue-liner Zach Secord’s first NOJHL goal stood up to be the game-winner as the Rock held on to edge the Hearst Lumberjacks 3-2 at the McIntyre Arena Friday night.
“My defensive partner (Elijah Pool) fed the puck across to me and I just stepped in an put a little floater on net and the puck ended up in the back of the net,” Secord said, describing how the play developed that result in his first career NOJHL tally.
“It was pretty exciting, a huge goal.”
Secord has played in 15 games this season, picking up five assists to go along with his initial NOJHL goal. In 2023-24 he got into 10 games as an affiliate player and dished out four helpers, after playing in a pair of regular season games in 2022-23 and two playoff games in 2023.
“I have been really focused on defence first, especially in my first year, making sure I play our systems correctly,” he said.
Following a scoreless opening period, Beard broke in all alone to score an unassisted shorthanded marker, his sixth goal of the season, 3:04 into the middle frame.
Exactly one minute later, blue-liner Adam Shillinglaw netted a power-play marker, his ninth tally of the campaign to tie things up for the Lumberjacks.
But the Rock were able to retake the lead before the second intermission, thanks to Kelly’s ninth goal of the season.
Secord’s seeing eye shot from the point then found the back of the Hearst net early in the third period to put the Rock in front 3-1.
That marker would prove to be critical, as Liam Boswell’s eighth tally of the campaign pulled the Lumberjacks back to within a single goal shortly after the midway point in the frame.
The Lumberjacks pulled goalie Alexandre Boivin in favour of an extra attacker with 1:36 remaining in regulation in hopes of netting an equalizer, but the Rock held firm.
Secord was happy to see his squad earn its sixth-straight win, against arguably the toughest team they have played during that stretch.
“Everyone competed really hard and worked non-stop out there tonight,” he said.
“We were just able to grind them down.”
Secord admitted a critical component to the Rock’s success Friday night was taking the lead and then not giving it up.
“It is a lot easier to play when you are ahead, especially against a team like Hearst” he said. “It was a big rivalry game.”
The Rock coach thought both teams played solid hockey in Friday night’s contest.
“It was a great game and we were happy to come out on top,” Perry said.
“The next time we play them, it will be more of the same and they will likely come out a little harder, but any time we play them it is always a good, fast-paced game. It wasn’t as chippy as it normally would be. It was just a really good hockey game, back and forth.”
The coach liked what he saw from Secord in all three zones of the ice Friday night.
“He is playing great hockey, he really is,” Perry said. “He is big, he is strong, he is rangy, great on the (penalty) kill and he does have underrated offensive ability. He quarterbacked the power play for the Timmins Majors last year, a championship club. As he gets older and matures as a player, that’s kind of in the cards for him. He has been fantastic.”
Riley stopped 17 of the 19 shots he faced to earn his 11th win of the season.
Boivin, who turned aside 19 of the 22 shots the Rock directed his way, was tagged with the loss.
NOJHL NOTES — The Daily Press three stars of Sunday’s game were Cyr, Kelly and Rock forward Reece Liu (three assists), while Beard, Shillinglaw and Secord were selected Friday … The Rock went 4-7 on the power play Sunday, while the Beavers were 1-8 with the man advantage. Friday, the Rock went 0-2 on the power play, while the Lumberjacks were 1-5 with the man advantage … Official attendance at the McIntyre Arena Sunday was 804, while 896 fans attended Friday’s contest … Sunday’s only other contest saw the Thunderbirds double up the Espanola Paper Kings in Sault Ste. Marie … The Rock will return to action on Friday when they host the Paper Kings at the McIntyre Arena, at 7 p.m.
