One hundred fifty-six days ago, the North Bay Battalion eliminated the Barrie Colts in the second round of the OHL playoffs, winning the game 3-1 and taking the series in a do-or-die seventh game. For Colts players, that’s 156 long days. It left a sour taste in the mouths of the players.
Thursday night marked the home opener for the Barrie Colts, and who else would they welcome into Sadlon Arena but the North Bay Battalion.
Six minutes into the first period, the Colts found themselves in a hole as Anthony Romani opened up the scoring with a wrist shot going over the blocker of Ben West.
Barrie would offer some pushback, but Charlie Robertson stood tall as the Battalion kept the 1-0 lead after 20 minutes.
Halfway through the 2nd period, Kashawn Aitcheson would find some open space on the right circle and would score on a tape-to-tape feed from Beau Jelsma to tie the game up 1-1. Aitcheson is looking to take that next step in his game this year, and he had a tremendous game against the Battalion on Thursday night.
The joy would be shortly lived as Owen Van Steensel would jam the puck home past Ben West three minutes later to regain the lead for the Battalion, making it a 2-1 game.
In such a key moment, you look towards your special teams to help give you some momentum. Beau Jelsma did just that, scoring five hole on Robertson to tie the game at 2-2.
Barrie’s first round pick, Shamar Moses, is going to put the league on notice. His vision and offensive awareness were on display against North Bay. With Moses being 16 years old, he still has a ton of time to grow, mature, and develop into an offensive threat.
There is going to be a ton of hype surrounding Moses.
The Battalion have a rookie of their own they were excited to showcase on Thursday night. Iggy Pazii. The Kharkiv native was taken in the first round of the CHL Import Draft by the Battalion. The Battalion has had recent success in developing players that come overseas; we saw with how Matvey Petrov flourished.
With six minutes left in a tied game, newly appointed Colts captain Connor Punnett was penalized for interference sending Pazii and the Battalion to the powerplay, where Pazii picks up the loose puck, spun around, and fired it past West as the Battalion once again regained the lead.
Barrie was throwing everything they could at the net since they had to open up and be more aggressive on the forecheck.
With under 30 seconds remaining in the game, Seattle Kraken prospect Eduard Sale wins a puck battle and finds a wide open Connor Punnett who ripped it and sent the Sadlon Arena into a frenzy as the game headed to overtime.
Eduard Sale who has put the eyes of many scouts and hockey fans on himself by having a strong showing at the recent World Juniors, where he scored six points in seven games, and getting drafted by the Seattle Kraken in the first round of the 2023 NHL Draft, proved his worth as he was the lone goal scorer in the shootout as the Colts win a thriller of a score 4-3 via the shootout.
Up next for the Barrie Colts and North Bay Battalion: they travel to the North Bay Memorial Gardens to play against one another Friday night. Puck drop is set for 7 pm EST.
