Specialty teams proved the difference as the Haliburton County Huskies bit the Cobourg Cougars 4-3 in their season opener Sept. 6 in Minden – sending 465 fans home happy.
It was a tight 2-2 game into the middle of the third period. However, Cobourg’s Lincoln Edwards took back-to-back penalties; one at 10:42 for hooking, and another at 15:03 for tripping.
The Huskies powerplay went to work: Alex Rossi scored at 11:51 to give the Huskies a 3-2 lead, with assists to Oliver Tang and Cristian Giancola. Then, Giancola bulged the twine at 16:31, from Carter Petrie and Connor Hollebek (his third helper of the game) to put the home team over the edge.
A Cobourg marker at 19:29 with an extra attacker on the ice made it look close on the scoreboard. The Huskies penalty killers also held Cobourg at bay for six minutes of the game.
Coach Jordan Bailey said “specialty teams were huge. Any time you can score two powerplay goals and not get scored against on a PK, it’s going to give you a really good chance to win.”
It was Petrie who scored the first goal of the season for the blue and white, at 7:46 of the first, from Hollebek and Curtis Allen.
Cobourg answered at 1:50 of the second, as Wyatt Gregory found the back of the net behind Stephen Totl.
Daniel Vasic gave the Huskies the lead back when he scored at 8:09, from Rossi and Hollebek going into the second intermission.
Early in the third, Cobourg tied it at twos, on an Edwards goal at 1:10 before his two trips to the sin bin that potentially cost his team the game.
Totl was solid between the pipes, turning aside 22 of 25 shots.
Bailey said, “I thought for the most part, with a new group and a lot of new players, we did well. I think there’s always things to work on early in the season, especially with a younger team, but I thought we did what we had to do to win a hockey game which was the big thing.”
In preparing for North York Sept. 13, Bailey said they are a young team, too, so “focus on our systems and what we need to do.”
Next up: The Huskies host the North York Rangers Sept. 13 at S.G Nesbitt Memorial Arena. Puck drop is slated for 4 p.m.
