Thunderbirds Edge the Eagles in Cross Border West Division Clash

Photo Credit: Freeze Frame Photos

With only two points the third place (29-13-4-1) Soo Thunderbirds and the fifth place (29-17-1-2) Soo Eagles with the Thunderbirds having to games in hand with 63 points, the Thunderbirds headed across the St Mary’s River to take on their cross border rivals, the Soo Eagles in a west division NOJHL contest on Wednesday, February 21st.

With the Thunderbirds on a powerplay 5:49 into the opening period, Kelsey Ouellet fires a wrist shot from just inside the centre of the blueline to find the back of Eagle goaltender Anthony Zolezzi’s net for his 16th of the season unassisted. Zach Sweitzer catches a pass from Luke Russell just outside the visitors blueline to break into the Thunderbirds zone all alone to lift the tying goal over Thunderbird netminder Kolton Bourrett’s catcher to pull the Eagles even 1 – 1 at 12:29 of the second period. With the Thunderbirds on a five on three powerplay, Grayson Ebrahim picks up a rebound off of Zolezzi’s to the right of the Eagles net to slide the go-ahead goal past Zolezzi with twenty seconds remaining in the period to send the Thunderbirds into the second intermission up 2 – 1. Jonathan Sonedecker and Sam Lake drew the assists on Ebrahim’s 24th of the season.

Ebrahim fires a pass from behind the Eagles net to Jonathan Sonedecker in the right faceoff circle to sink his seventh of the season for the Thunderbirds third goal of the contest over Zolezzi’s catcher to bring the visitors lead to 3 – 1 at 5:09 of the third. Shorthanded with 2:42 remaining in the midweek clash in Sault Ste Marie, Michigan, Landon Stevens catches a pass from Jack Paweski in the right faceoff circle for Stevens to cut across the front of the Thunderbirds crease to slide the Eagles second under Bourret to close the gap to one. Sault Ste Marie, Ontario native Michael Starzomski notched the other helper on Stevens seventh of the season. Eagle goaltender Anthony Zolezzi stopped 44 of 47 shots in the loss while Thunderbird netminder Kolton Bourret turned away 32 of 34 shots in the 3 – 2 win.

The Thunderbirds next opponents will be the Eagles back in Sault Ste Marie, Ontario at the John Rhodes Centre in a 7:00 p.m puck drop on Friday, February 23rd.

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