Ottawa 67’s bounce back in 6-1 win over Kingston in regular season finale

There were some very important things on the line for both the Ottawa 67’s and Kingston Frontenacs on March 21 as they wanted to gain momentum and an edge over each other as game one of the first round draws nearer.

Both hockey teams came out of the gate with heavy physicality and made the game have that playoff feel that was expected.

The first period was very quiet on the score sheet and both goalies Jaeden Nelson (Ottawa) and Matthew Minchak (Kingston) had to be on the ball for some grade A chances. The shots were 9-8 Kingston after 20 minutes.

Ottawa got into some penalty trouble once again as they had three penalties to start the first half of the second period including one at the end of the first period.

Kingston’s Matthew Henderson finally broke through on power play number four walked into the slot off a nice pass and blew it by Jaeden Nelson for his second of the season to break the tie and make it 1-0 Kingston at 9:53 of the second. The assists came from Robin Kuzma and Landon Wright.

67’s forward Thomas Vandenberg evened up the hockey game with his 25th of the season, off a pass that was centered from a flying Frankie Marrelli and Vandenberg put home the pass. It was a 1-1 game at 12:57. Cooper Foster had the other assist.

It took the 67’s only 37 seconds after the Vandenberg goal to capture the lead as defenceman David Bedkowski stepped right below the hashmarks and ripped it blocker side to give Ottawa the 2-1 lead. He received the pass from Nic Sima and Jasper Kuhta at 13:34.

Ottawa began to take over the game as the shots were 23-17 after 40 minutes of play.

At the end of the second period, there was a big scrum that resulted in the officials calling Kingston’s Andre Mondoux for slashing which sent Ottawa to their first power-play to start the third period.

67’s captain Cooper Foster capitalized on that 67’s power-play for his 29th of the season to extend Ottawa’s led to 3-1 with a tip in from Kohyn Eshkawkogan’s point shot, 34 seconds into the third period.

67’s forward Teddy Spitznagel knocked home the rebound on another power-play to extend the 67’s lead to three as he scores his second OHL goal in back-to-back games. Assists came from Sam McCue and Connor Bewick at 11:27 to make it 4-1 Ottawa.

Jasper Kuhta extended the 67’s goal with a beautiful shot that was set up by Nic Whitehead and Nic Sima at 15:10 of the third to make it 5-1 67’s.

Sam McCue puts extra insurance on a dominant third period with a give and go play with defenceman Frankie Marrelli to make it 6-1 Ottawa at 17:53. Zach Houben got the secondary assist.

67’s goalie Jaeden Nelson stopped 24 of 25 shots faced on goal and made some marquee saves when needed in the 6-1 win.

There were no post-game interviews due to a team banquet.

The 67’s will kick off game one of the OHL Playoffs on March 27 at TD Place against the same Kingston Frontenacs they just played.