* WOODSTOCK RENEGADES *

OHA Niagara District Junior C Hockey Club

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Monday, November 02nd, 2009

Renegades lose to Rangers in overtime

The Glanbrook Rangers came from behind to beat the Woodstock Renegades 5-4 in overtime Sunday.

With seconds to go in overtime, a bad pass in neutral ice was picked up by Glanbrook and skated into the Renegades' defensive end in a two-on-one, with the puck ultimately sailing past Woodstock goaltender Mitchell Bleskie.

"We let that one get away from us," Renegades coach Dave McLaren said after the game. "We always want to play for the win... but we reached the red-line on that play and let it get away from us.

"We got close, turned the puck over and they came in and scored."

It was a disappointing end to what had been a very promising start.

The Renegades were up 2-0 before the first five minutes of the game had passed, holding the Rangers scoreless through the remainder of the first frame. Glanbrook got one goal back in the second, tying the game at 2-2 in the opening seconds of the third frame.

Woodstock seemed to get some momentum out of the tying goal, with Tyler Labadie scoring the third goal on a beautiful attack where he plowed through the Glanbrook defense and beat goaltender Mark Idzikowski glove side. Craig Thomson had an almost identical goal on a rush a few minutes later to add the insurance marker.

Glanbrook would come within one and then, with the sixth man on, take advantage of Bleskie's unmarked open side with two seconds on the clock to force overtime.

"We're happy with the effort tonight being we've been suck a sick hockey team," Glanbrook coach Tom Cole said. "We had three guys out of the lineup and five guys who shouldn't have been playing tonight."

Cole said he wasn't worried about the Renegades' early jump in the first, noting he was disappointed his team's power play didn't respond in the opportunities it was able to get.

"After the first, I thought we were the better, faster team," Cole said. "We had to just keep going and not quit-- if we played our (style) game, we would come back and win it."

For his part McLaren called the Rangers' comeback "just one of those things."

"One of the things we're not doing is shooting the puck and we have to do that when we have the opportunity," McLaren said. "When we're under 30 shots a game and the top-playing team has 40 it makes the difference."

That said McLaren gave Labadie and Thomson their due for their goals, saying they "just dove in there and took the shot."

The second weekend of the Woodstock Legion Regional Silver Stick Hockey Tournament has the Renegades on the road for two games this coming weekend. The team travels to New Hamburg on Friday to face the Firebirds with a 7:30 p.m. start, hitting Simcoe on Sunday for a 7 p.m. start.

The team's next home game sees them host another Niagara east-division squad Nov. 13 as the Chippawa Riverhawks come to town.

 

(Source Sentinel-Review)