May 14 – The Saints celebrated Mother’s Day with an afternoon tilt against the Gloucester Griffins. It was a quick turnaround for both squads from Saturday night games and it showed as both teams were short players.
Cory Campbell was between the pipes for Newmarket, while Tristan Staff got the call for Gloucester.
Early on, it was the visitors that took it to the home side. The Griffins scored four times in the opening 12 minutes to put the Saints on their heels. With just over three minutes left in the frame, Brodie Willard was sent in all alone on a breakaway pass from Coulson Link and put the Newmarket on the board. Only a minute later, Brandon Tanacs cut the lead in half, before adding another with 25 seconds left to go into the intermission with the Griffins up 4-3.
In the second, things opened up with the two sides trading chances. Dante Romano evened the score early, but Gloucester pushed back, netting a pair of tallies to make it 6-4. Angus Rawding cut the lead to one with a nice outside shot, and then a minute later the Griffins struck again, scoring two quick ones to make it 8-5. Luckily for the Saints, the offence kept pushing and Rawding and Tanacs found the twine with their second and third goals respectively. Going into the break the Griffins held an 8-7 lead.
When the third started, the Saints finally seemed to find their legs. Dante Romano tied the game at eights just a minute in and followed up with go-ahead goal seven minutes later to complete his first Junior B hat trick. Rawding buried his third of the night 39 seconds later to extend the lead to 10-8. Campbell then shut the door the rest of the way and Dante Romano added his fourth of the night to give the Saints the win.
"They we're hungry and ready to go from the opening draw and we weren't prepared," said Saints Head Coach, Dan Ransom Sr. "Getting down four early , especially with a banged up group, was not the start we wanted.
"Our push back from that point on was impressive though. We played a heck of a third period with a tired group on the back end of two games in less then 24 hours against a very well coached team. Really proud of our effort (Sunday) afternoon."
Final score: Saints 11 – Griffins 8
Up next – the Saints get a few days off before heading Halton Hills Saturday night to take on the Bulldogs. First faceoff is set for 7:30PM at Mold-Masters SportsPlex.