(Trevor Hoskin of the Cobourg Cougars battles for a rebound during Wednesday’s game against the North York Rangers as part of the OJHL’s Governors’ Showcase. Photo by Jeff Gard)
By Jeff Gard/Today’s Northumberland
There was no home-ice advantage for the Cobourg Cougars during the Ontario Junior Hockey League Governors’ Showcase, hosted from Monday to Wednesday at the Cobourg Community Centre.
Following a 6-4 loss to the St. Michael’s Buzzers on Monday, the Cougars (5-5-0-0) were defeated 4-1 by the league-leading North York Rangers (10-2-1-0) on Wednesday.
“A lot of ups and downs in our game,” said Cougars captain Tucker Firth, who remains optimistic, though, about his club’s chances this OJHL season. “The past few games we did a lot of stuff right. There’s some stuff we still need to work on, but all in all looking past it we’re a great team. This is a team to be excited about, like I’ve said before. North York came to play and they capitalized on their chances and we didn’t unfortunately, but it was a good game on both sides.”
Cougars head coach Wes Wolfe echoed the sentiment.
“I thought it was a much closer game than the score indicated,” he said. “We talked about it as a team that at 5-on-5 I thought we carried the play, we generated a lot of chances. The goals they scored were off broken plays. Sometimes that happens. North York’s got a good team so when there are a couple breakdowns like that they can capitalize and that’s why their record is what it is.”
Cobourg fell behind 3-0 by the third minute of the second period. Kallaway Mercer answered back for the Cougars with a shorthanded goal at the 6:30 mark of that middle frame, but the Rangers promptly restored the three-goal advantage just 31 seconds later on a power-play goal from Sean Clarke.
Maxwell Donohoe, Zach Ophoven and Alexander Dimitriadis also scored for North York in the win.
Mercer extended his scoring streak to five games and now has seven goals during that span.
Turnovers, though, proved costly for the Cougars in the loss and Wolfe said that can be the result of players just trying to make a play, even if there’s not an opportunity for a good one to be made. That was addressed by the coach to his players post-game.
“If we want to be a team that is winning hockey games, we can’t be turning the puck over like that,” Wolfe said. “At the expense of trying to make a play we always want guys to look to make the right play.
“I thought especially as the game went on we found a rhythm and started to make some really good plays and created some scoring chances,” he added. “As far as the process goes, we can’t get too wrapped up in what the scoreboard said.”
Facing the top OJHL club did provide a good measuring stick for the Cougars to see where they stand in the early going of this season.
“Being able to compare and look at the other teams in this league, we’re right there,” Firth said. “We have to trust the process that our coaches are putting out for us and we need to capitalize and execute what they’re laying out.”
Firth, an overager who will consider his post-junior playing options at a later date, said it was “definitely exciting” for Cougars players to host and play in the Showcase in front of NHL and college scouts, but it was important to also remain focused on the task at hand.
“It’s a spark that you get…you’re excited and you’re ready to go and you’re in the rink and you know there’s going to be eyes on you, but it’s a league game, you have to come out and play for your teammates, not just for yourself,” he said. “If you get looks, you get looks and if you don’t you just need to be happy that you did everything you could for your team.”
Continuing their schedule, which includes nine games in 20 days, the Cougars head to Wellington on Friday at 7:30 p.m. to face the Dukes (5-5-0-1) and return home to take on the surprising Lindsay Muskies (7-3-0-2) at 7 p.m. at the CCC. Both the Dukes and Muskies won both their games at the Showcase in Cobourg.
“The game Friday night in Wellington is going to be a hard game as it always is against them. We played a tremendous game against them here in our home opener with the overtime win. I think our guys are really excited for the challenge. They’ve added some players, so have we and I think it will be a really good test for this group to see how we bounce back from today,” Wolfe said, noting he expects a strong test against the Muskies on Monday as well.
“There a team that plays with a lot of emotion. What we’ve found is even the games that they’ve lost, they’ve been in really close games because they ride the momentum, they play a very physical brand, they’re in your face, they make it tough on you and we have to be prepared for a hard game.”
