Timmins Rock goalie Jacob Brown managed to find the puck and make a save on a shot off the stick of French River Rapids forward Jackson Doyle on this play despite being showered with snow during the first period of Game 5 of the NOJHL East Division semifinal series at the McIntyre Arena Thursday night. Rock defenders Yan Bessette and Christophe Petit were able to clear the rebound before any of Doyle’s teammates could track it down. The Rock held on to edge the Rapids 4-3 and take the best-of-seven series 4-1. THOMAS PERRY/THE DAILY PRESS
Brady Harroun’s power-play goal with 2:13 remaining in regulation lifted the Timmins Rock to a 4-3 win over the French River Rapids at the McIntyre Arena Thursday night.
Thomas Perry
The Daily Press/Postmedia Network
TIMMINS – Brady Harroun’s power-play goal with 2:13 remaining in regulation lifted the Timmins Rock to a 4-3 win over the French River Rapids at the McIntyre Arena Thursday night.
The victory allowed the Rock to eliminate the Rapids 4-1 in their best-of-seven NOJHL East Division semifinal series and they will now face the winner of the other East Division semifinal series, which currently has the Powassan Voodoos up 3-1 on the Hearst Lumberjacks.
Early on, however, it looked like the Rock were going to be denied the opportunity to clinch the series on home ice.
The Rapids jumped out to a 1-0 lead on Brandon Melsness’ second goal of the playoffs just 1:55 into the opening period.
Owen Ethier then pounced on a loose puck in the Rock crease, behind goalie Jacob Brown, and slipped the puck into the wide-open cage for his first goal of the playoffs at the 3:08 mark of the middle frame.
Less than two minutes later, Harroun scored the first of his two tallies on the night and fifth of the playoffs to pull the Rock back to within a goal of the Rapids.
“Christophe Petit made a good play, getting the puck up the ice and found Piesy (Lucas Piekarczyk) and he made a good pass, put it right on my stick,” Harroun said.
“I put it into the back of the net to get the boys going.”
The Rapids held onto their one-goal advantage until the 12:46 mark of the third period, when Rock blue-liner Felix Cadieux-Fredette’s second goal of the playoffs tied things up at 2-2.
Just under three minutes later, Lucas Piekarczyk netted a power-play marker, his first goal of the playoffs, to give the Rock their first lead of the night.
And when Melsness was sent off holding 13 seconds later, it presented the Rock with an ideal opportunity to add a little insurance.
Instead, Josh Russell netted a shorthanded marker, his second goal of the playoffs, to tie things up at 3-3.
That set the stage for Harroun’s heroics and the NOJHL’s leading goal scorer — in the playoffs and the regular season — didn’t disappoint, netting a power-play marker, his second tally of the night and sixth of the playoffs.
“Ringer (Nolan Ring) got the puck on the left half wall and I found the open spot in the slot, put the puck on net and luckily it went in,” Harroun said.
Determined to battle back once again, the Rapids pulled goalie Brady Dyer in favour of an extra attacker in the game’s dying minutes, but they were unable to secure the equalizer they needed to force overtime.
While Harroun scored six goals in the series he came away impressed with both the Rapids and their goaltenders.
“You have to give that team a lot of credit,” he said.
“They battled hard every game and they made us fight for every inch. That goalie (Dyer) played unbelievable. I think we put 50 shots on him in four out of the five games, but he kept his team in it.”
Harroun had great success during the regular season and in the early stages of the playoffs playing on a line with Nicolas Pigeon but the Rock captain was on the sidelines for Game 5 with a lower-body injury.
“I played with Slick (Nicholas Frederick) and Piesy (Piekarczyk) and we were clicking all night,” he said.
“We were hounding them in their zone on the forecheck every shift and we got rewarded, but we would have loved to have had all those guys sitting out in the lineup.”
In addition to Pigeon, the Rock were missing forwards Kaeden McArthur and Ethan Pool, as well as blue-liners Brandon Rossetti and Tenzin Nyman Thursday night.
“It is good to finish this series early, maybe not as early as we wanted, but it will give those guys a chance to get some rest,” Harroun said.
The Rock forward has no preference in terms of whether the Rock face the Voodoos or the Lumberjacks in the East Division final.
“They are both great teams and we had good battles against them all year,” Harroun said.
Rock assistant coach James Daschuk admitted Thursday night’s contest was a bit of an emotional roller-coaster.
“In the playoffs, it (emotions) is magnified times 10,” he said.
“You just have to find a way to keep your composure when things aren’t going well.
“I don’t think we played our best game tonight by any means, but we stuck with it and things worked out in our favour tonight.”
One of the keys to the victory for the Rock was that goalie Jacob Brown kept the Rapids from getting a third goal when they were leading 2-0 and then 2-1.
“Two goals don’t seem to be as big a deal as they once were,” Daschuk said.
“Three, however, would have been a pretty big obstacle.
“We knew we were going to get a goal. It has been one of our strengths all year, scoring goals, and we just had a little feeling, if we could get the next one, we would be okay.”
The assistant coach agreed both of Harroun’s goals were equally important.
“Goal scorers score goals and that first one was huge for us,” Daschuk said.
“Obviously, his second one was big, too, and that’s what we expect from him. That’s why he is here.”
The assistant coach was also pleased with what he saw from Cadieux-Fredette on both sides of the puck Thursday night.
“He did a great job tonight of getting shots through (to the net),” Daschuk said.
“I give them a lot of credit because they did a good job of filling lanes and not really allowing us to run most of our set plays in the Offensive Zone.
“We had to kind of make things up as we went, so we knew we had to get shots from the point, get a lot of traffic and our D had to be pretty mobile back there, walking the line.
“He is always fantastic defensively, that’s never an issue.”
There was no shortage of Rock players who impressed the assistant coach with their play in the contest.
“I think our penalty kill did a fantastic job,” Daschuk said.
“Juice (Justin Charette) and Ringer (Ring), up front, Ryno (Hayden Rynard), Grigs (Evan Grigor) and Slick (Frederick) did a fantastic job up front and the D on the back end, Trottsy (Kyle Trottier), Longer (Chase Longhurst) and Freddie (Cadieux-Fredette) and Chris (Petit), too.
“You don’t get your name on the scoresheet for killing penalties, but during that second period I think we had five or so in a row.”
Grigor (upper-body) was added to the Rock’s already lengthy injury list when he left the game in the third period, but until the extent of the damage has been confirmed he is listed as day-to-day.
Rapids coach and general manager Paul Frustaglio was naturally disappointed to see his squad’s playoff run come to an end, but proud of how well they played against the NOJHL’s No. 1 seed.
“We had a game plan but in the end the better team won,” he said.
“Timmins has just a great hockey team. They don’t stop and they are well coached, have a great organization.
“We did our best and I am hoping we did enough to get them ready for the next series, instead of it being a cake walk like everybody was saying.”
The Rapids coach was especially proud of his squad’s work ethic and how well they followed their systems during their brief playoff run.
“We had a bunch of young kids but they didn’t stop trying,” Frustaglio said.
“The odds were highly against us, but that didn’t deter our players from working hard and keeping the faith.
“We took a couple of late penalties, which ended up with us losing the game but I thought it was a great game right up until the very last second.
“We almost tied it up and you can’t ask any more from your players.”
Despite the final score, the Rapids coach was pleased with what he saw from all of his players.
“I have to start with Brady Dyer, he was really dialed in during this series,” Frustaglio said.
“He had a great series, but so did everybody. This is a team game and I don’t what to single out anybody right now because I believe everybody did their part.”
Only two of the players on the Rapids’ roster — forward Aidan Baker and blue-liner Jack Ginocchi — will be too old to return next season, giving them a solid corps around which to build.
“We have a lot of kids from the North, locally, from Sudbury and North Bay and I believe they will be coming back,” Frustaglio said.
“They always wanted to play for the Rapids and all of these 16 and 17 year olds we have gained so much experience and after having success in the playoffs, and as far as I am concerned it was successful for us, they are going to come back even stronger.
“I believe we will have a strong team next year with these young guys. I am not sure if we will be super great, but we will be better.”
Brown stopped 26 of the 26 shots he faced to earn his third victory of the series.
Dyer, who turned aside 29 of the 33 shots the Rock directed his way, was tagged with the loss.
NOJHL NOTES — The Daily Press three stars of the game were Harroun, Cadieux-Fredette and Melsness … The Rock went 2-6 on the power play, but allowed a shorthanded marker, while the Rapids were 0-5 with the man advantage … Official attendance at the McIntyre Arena was 792 … Thursday’s only other contest saw the Cubs dump the Espanola Paper Kings 5-3 in Greater Sudbury to take their West Division semifinal series 4-1.
“Highlight of the Night” – NOJHL YouTube Channel
