Tigers open 2023 with four-game road skid

January 5, 2023 · 0 Comments

The Aurora Tigers will have their work cut out for them to start off the New Year.

The Tigers will take on the Cobourg Cougars, Markham Royals, Collingwood Blues and the Trenton Golden Hawks over the course of the next two weeks.

Tigers’ head coach Greg Johnston said this team’s New Year Resolution needs to be team consistency.

“There are times where we play really well and there are times where we don’t play as well as we need to play. If I can say the one word that’s a New Year’s resolution is consistency of play within the entire group,” Johnston said.

“A little bit of tough luck with some players with injuries. Our guys that have come in the lineup and our APs have been great. But, just more consistency throughout.”

Currently the Tigers are missing Peter Lopes and Noah De Santis on the back end. The group has had to tighten things up without them and remain organized and that did happen on New Year’s Eve in a tough road game against the Haliburton County Huskies who are one of the top teams in the league.

In front of 579 Haliburton faithful, the Tigers only fell 2-0 and, despite the result, Johnston was pleased with the performance.

“Haliburton is a hell of a hockey team. They play big. They play strong. They play physical. We responded pretty well,” Johnston said.

“They have a young goalie (Aidan Spooner) who has 1.76 goals against average. They’ve given up 63 goals all year. We’re not the only ones that have struggled. In saying that, we created opportunities and they closed the door on us. I thought it was a very good hockey game overall.”

The Tigers currently have an 8-6-1-1 record on the road so far this year, which is a few games better than their record at home.

With this upcoming schedule, also comes along with the excitement of the OJHL All-Star weekend next week, that will feature Tigers captain Lucas Stanojevic as part of that special event.

The Tigers are 15-14-2-4 so far this year and currently sit in sixth place in the North/West Conference.

By Robert Belardi