Photo courtesy of Ottawa 67's
Star forward Tye Felhaber had himself another outstanding week of scoring, something Ottawa 67’s fans have become accustomed to this season. The sniper helped lead Ottawa to two consecutive wins this weekend.
Felhaber, the league’s leading scorer, reached the 40-goal mark for the first time in his OHL career. In a Sunday afternoon victory, he buried an empty-netter (his 44th goal of the season) with his grandmother in the building to celebrate her 85th birthday.
“Grandma wouldn’t be too happy if I didn’t get a goal tonight,” joked Felhaber after the game.
Earlier in the weekend, Felhaber outdid himself with a superhuman third period effort in the team’s loss in Niagara. In the last game of 2018, a New Year’s Eve battle against the IceDogs, the 67’s fell 6-5.
It was a high scoring affair in which Ottawa attempted to mount a late comeback. Felhaber scored three goals in the final frame, a hat trick in a span of 20 minutes.
The 67’s scored four of their five goals in the third period to give themselves a shot down the stretch, including one with under a minute remaining, but they could not score the equalizer to force overtime.
The IceDogs built their lead on the strength of two dominant periods. They opened the scoring with a power play mark from Oliver Castleman. A minute later, Castleman found the back of the net once again, this time with an even strength goal.
Graeme Clark scored on the power play early in the second period but the IceDogs stormed back with three straight goals to finish the frame up 5-1. Ottawa gave Niagara a late scare but the IceDogs ultimately held on for the victory.
On Friday night, Ottawa bounced back with a 2-0 shutout against the Barrie Colts.
While both goaltenders played well, the 67’s outshot the Colts by 14. Ottawa’s Noel Hoefenmayer scored the game winner in the second period. The stud defenseman is now only two points away from his previous career high (40), which he reached two seasons ago.
Felhaber added an empty-netter late to clinch the victory and Cedrick Andree recorded his second shutout of the season.
The game was rookie Marco Rossi’s first since his injury in mid-November. The Austrian led all rookies in both goals and points before he was injured. In Sunday’s 7-4 win over the Oshawa Generals, Rossi totaled three assists.
Sunday’s matchup showed that the 67’s remain virtually unstoppable offensively on their best day. The team went 3/5 on the power play and got the scoring party going early. Hoefenmayer scored just 17 seconds in the game to give Ottawa the early lead.
The 67’s scored three goals in both the first and second periods and forwards Austen Keating and Jack Quinn each found the back of the net twice in the blowout win.
Ottawa is now 4-1 since returning from the holiday break. They remain the top team in the OHL with the most points and wins.
The 67’s will hit the road this weekend to take on the Sarnia Sting (Friday), London Knights (Saturday) and the Guelph Storm (Sunday).
