The Windsor Spitfires snapped a four-game OHL losing streak in dramatic fashion with a 4-3 overtime win over the Saginaw Spirit in OHL action at the WFCU Centre Sunday.
Saginaw jumped out to an early lead midway through the first on a goal from Bode Wilde, the lone goal of the first period.
Jake Goldowski gave the Spirit to a 2-0 lead before Windsor's offence woke up to pull within one on a bullet from Will Cuylle from the slot. Connor Corcoran tied things up 2-2 on a blast from the point to end the second frame.
"[Trevor Letowski] Kind of told us, we've got nothing to rest our energy for, we have ten days off coming up, it's a division rivalry, we need the two points," says Spitfires forward Tyler Angle.
Saginaw jumped in front in the third on a Danny Katic goal, but Angle buried a rebound to tie things up at three in dramatic fashion after goalie Kari Piiroinen was pulled for the extra attacker with just under three-minutes left in the period.
"We drew up a play that worked pretty well. It came from winning the draw and obviously getting the shots on net and crashing," says Angle. "The puck kind of bounced out to me. If I would have missed that I probably wouldn't have a very good Christmas break."
Daniel D'Amico finished a two-on-one break by depositing a pass from Angle past Spirit goalie Tristan Lennox for a 4-3 overtime win.
Angle says a fifth straight loss would have been hard to swallow heading into the break.
"Would have been a little tough to get over that, we're coming off a pretty big losing streak and to get the two points in overtime obviously is huge," he says. "Now to just have some fun with family, go home and enjoy Christmas."
Associate Coach Jerrod Smith tells AM800 News the team showed a lot of character.
"We never quit being down 2-0, being down 3-2 against a really good team who's rolling coming into our building playing their third game in three nights," says Smith. "We wanted to jump on them early, thought we had a pretty good start that kind of faded off the second half of the first period, but we found a way to win."
Windsor heads to Budweiser Gardens after the Christmas break to continue its rivalry with the London Knights on Friday Dec. 28 — puck drops at 7:30pm.
Tune into AM800 for all the action.