Marco Mignosa recorded four points as the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds defeated the Brantford Bulldogs 8-2 on Friday, November 24, 2023.
Both teams entered the night with six wins in their past ten games and had combined for just three regulation losses between them over the same span.
The Greyhounds opened the scoring at 10:43 with Marco Mignosa scoring his seventh of the season from the top of the left circle right off an Owen Allard faceoff win to get the visitiors out to a 1-0 lead. The Bulldogs answered back through Cole Brown recording his fifth goal of the season at 15:38 off a brilliant individual rush by Marek Vanacker, making a self pass to elude a Greyhounds defender and feeding Brown in the right circle for his one-timer, knotting the game 1-1.
After Bulldogs netminder David Egorov turned aside a Brady Martin breakaway, the Greyhounds took the lead back. While shorthanded at 18:03, Mignosa sprung Jordan D’Intino on a breakaway, D’Intino held the puck off his hip down the slot and fired a shot over Egorov’s pad for his eighth the season giving the Greyhounds a 2-1 lead they took into the first intermission.
Florian Xhekaj opened the middle frame drawing a penalty as he tried to drag the puck across the front of Landon Miller’s goal. However, the Greyhounds were the ones to take advantage with a second short-handed goal. D’Intino collected his second of the night with Mignosa finding him all alone in the slot to walk down and tuck the puck past Egorov’s pad for a 3-1 lead at 2:42. The Bulldogs responded quickly, at 3:55, with Callum Cheynowski knocking down a clearing attempt at the left point and rocketing a point shot the the front of the Soo goal, where Noah Nelson tipped the puck past Landon Miller for his second the season, pulling the Bulldogs back to within one at 3-2.
Bulldogs drew another power play in hopes to carry the momentum to even up the game. Jack Beck found a little puck luck to score his eighth of the season from a shot above the left circle that bounced off Lucas Moore’s skate and into the Bulldogs goal giving the Greyhounds a 4-2 lead at 6:48. At 7:28, the Bulldogs received a 5-minute power play after Greyhounds forward Julian Fantino was given a game misconduct for a check to the head on Bulldogs rookie Jake O’Brien. O’Brien exited the game briefly but then returned to the bench for the Bulldogs in the period. Florian Xhekaj nearly found the net, batting the puck out of the air as Miller sprawled across the goal before the Hounds netminder stole a near certain goal from Nick Lardis on a great cross-ice feed from Patrick Thomas. With one more chance before the power-play expired, Tomas Hamara fed Lucas Moore at the right point to fire a shot on goal that dented the goal post and kept the Greyhounds up 4-2 through 40 minutes.
The final frame was all Greyhounds, Justin Cloutier opened the period at 2:22 scoring his 12th of the season to push the lead to 5-2. At 14:45, Owen Allard bumped the score to 6-2 on his 11th fo the season with Marco Mignosa earning his fourth point of the game on the assist. Arttu Karki added his 15th of the season, and OHL leading tenth on the power-play at 16:06 while Travis Hayes closed the proceedings at 18:45 with his seventh f the year giving the Greyhounds an 8-2 win in Brantford.
