In the midst of a two-game losing streak, the Soo Greyhounds found some life offensively on Wednesday.
Having lost three of their last four games, the Greyhounds exploded offensively Wednesday night in the opening game of a three-game road trip.
That life was in the form of a seven-goal second period against the Sudbury Wolves.
The period lifted the Greyhounds to an 8-2 win over the Wolves at Sudbury Community Arena.
“It’s our best period of hockey all season long,” said Greyhounds coach John Dean.
“The biggest thing is we played with swagger, intent,” Dean added. “We really attacked the interior of the offensive zone and when we didn’t have the puck, we were relentless to get it back. That’s the key. If you’re going to play our style, you have to make sure you do it on both sides.”
Dean also used the word phenomenal to describe the frame.
“The second period, we just took it up to another level,” added forward Jeremy Martin. “We had a good first period and then we kept building on that and when the second period hit, we just started firing on all cylinders.”
“We crushed their confidence pretty early and we just kept rolling,” Martin added.
A team that has struggled to put together full 60-minute efforts at times this season, Dean said Wednesday’s game
“We thought the first period; we generated a lot of opportunities off the rush. We thought we managed the puck really well, but it was a little back and forth for our liking, but a lot of opportunities to score,” Dean said. “Second period, obviously we explode in the O zone.”
“The third period, we continued to press,” Dean added, saying he felt the Greyhounds were “pretty disciplined in our puck management and still managed to generate a lot of opportunities” in the final period.
Dean called the game “as close to a 60-minute effort we’re going to get here so far this year.”
After a scoreless opening period, the Greyhounds broke things open in the second period.
The Greyhounds opened the scoring as Jeremy Martin picked up his first goal as a member of the Greyhounds. Martin got the puck and skated into the right faceoff circle before beating Sudbury goaltender Finn Marshall from the top of the circle high glove side 1:20 into the second period.
Marco Mignosa then took a short pass from Brady Martin in the slot and got to the net before tucking the puck 5-hole on Marshall at 6:36.
On the next shift, Brady Smith went to the net and redirected a pass from Jeremy Martin past Marshall to make it a 3-0 game 40 seconds later.
The Wolves got on the board at 13:20 of the second period when Kieron Walton took a pass in the left faceoff circle from Nathan Villeneuve and beat Greyhounds goaltender Landon Miller with a quick shot to make it a 3-1 game.
Mignosa grabbed his second goal of the game 46 seconds later when he took a pass from Brady Martin at the bottom of the left circle and beat Marshall high short side from the sharp angle to give the Greyhounds a 4-1 lead.
The Greyhounds ended Marshall’s night in goal for the Wolves when Quinn McKenzie beat the Wolves netminder with a shot from the top of the right faceoff circle high glove side 43 seconds after Mignosa’s.
The visitors extended the lead to 6-1 at 18:09 of the second period when Jordan Charron beat new Wolves netminder Owen Leonard from the left faceoff circle. The goal came after Leonard stopped a shot from Ryan Kaczynski initially with the Greyhounds on the man advantage.
Smith picked up his second goal of the game with 1:02 to go in the period as he scored on a rebound from the right faceoff circle after Leonard stopped him initially on the play from the right wing.
Charron grabbed his second goal of the night at 5:56 of the third period when he scored on a loose pick at the edge of the crease to make it an 8-1 game.
Walton capped off the scoring with 5:33 to go in the third as he scored his second goal of the game, beating Miller from the bottom of the right faceoff circle on the power play after taking a cross-ice pass from Alex Pharand.
Charron finished the night with two goals and an assist for the Greyhounds while Jeremy Martin also had a three-point night with a goal and a pair of helpers.
Asked about the play of Jeremy Martin in the win, Dean agreed it was the young forward’s best game with the team.
“This is the hockey player we have on our hands, and I can’t wait to see what he looks like in a month and a half, two months,” Dean said.
Dean also spoke highly of Smith following the win.
“We talk about roles on our team, and we’d all be lying if different players have different roles,” Dean said. “We talked to Brady before the game. We asked him what he thought and who he was, and he said a defensive forward, and we disagreed.”
“We said being defensively responsible doesn’t mean you have to be a defensive forward,” Dean added.
“Hopefully the barn doors opened here for Brady,” Dean also said.
The goals were the first two of the season for Smith.
“It’s definitely nice to get the monkey off the back,” Smith said.
McKenzie (one goal, one assist), Brady Martin (two assists), and Noah Laus (two assists) also chipped in with multi-point nights for the Greyhounds while Smith and Mignosa scored twice each.
Miller made 25 saves for the Sault in the win.
Villeneuve assisted on both Sudbury goals by Walton.
Before being pulled, Marshall stopped 16 of 21 shots for Sudbury. Leonard stopped 19 of 22 shots the rest of the way for the Wolves in just over 25 minutes of work.
The win kicked off a three-game road trip for the Greyhounds that will take the team to North Bay on Thursday to face the Battalion before it wraps up Saturday in Oshawa against the Generals in a 4 p.m. start.
The Greyhounds improve to 9-6-1-0 on the season with Wednesday’s win while the Wolves fall to 4-9-1-0.