{"id":21623,"date":"2018-09-20T00:56:51","date_gmt":"2018-09-20T04:56:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=21623"},"modified":"2018-09-27T12:22:09","modified_gmt":"2018-09-27T16:22:09","slug":"tigers-drop-the-puck-on-perfect-start-to-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/tigers-drop-the-puck-on-perfect-start-to-season\/","title":{"rendered":"Tigers drop the puck on perfect start to season"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Jake Courtepatte<\/strong><\/p>\n

Same rivalry, new combatants.
\nThe first leg of the 2018-19 Battle of Yonge Street has decidedly gone to the Aurora Tigers, who doubled up on the Newmarket Hurricanes in a home-and-home start to the new Ontario Junior Hockey League season.
\nIn an odd twist, the term \u201chome\u201d did not necessarily apply for the Hurricanes who hosted the Tigers on Thursday, forced out of their own ice at the Ray Twinney Complex due to the installation of new dehumidification and air conditioning units.
\nInstead hosting at the Magna Centre\u2019s main ice, the Aurora club seemed the more comfortable of the two when veteran Joseph Mizzi opened the season\u2019s scoring just 39 seconds in, finishing off a centering pass from newly-minted captain Steve MacLean.
\nAfter Newmarket took the lead 2 \u2013 1, Hollander Thompson made his OJHL debut one to remember by potting a Landis Antonic rebound to send the game to overtime.
\nIt took just over twenty-three minutes of extra time for Mizzi to give the Tigers the two points, finishing off a back-and-forth passing play with Michael Palandra.
\nBoth teams had to reset quickly for the Tigers home opener on Friday night, where despite the Magna Hoedown festivities just down the street, around 500 fans packed into the Aurora Community Centre.
\nA ceremonial opening faceoff featuring a number of faces from Tigers past set the tone for another grueling battle, featuring some heavy defense in the first period.
\nWith the score tied at zero late in the frame, MacLean showed why he earned the \u2018C\u2019 by catching up to a Newmarket forward on a breakaway and stripping the puck, before Jacob Ball went the other way and opened the scoring for the home team with eight seconds on the clock.
\nBoth Mizzi and Palandra finished rebounds in the second period to give Aurora a 3 \u2013 0 lead, with Spencer making it a four-goal game early in the third period.
\nJack Irvine\u2019s shutout bid was only broken with just under three minutes to play, when the Hurricanes scored shorthanded for a finals core of 4 \u2013 1.
\nWrapping up the week with a 3 \u2013 2 win over the Oakville Blades at home on Saturday, Evan Spencer played the hero in potting the game winner with just under three minutes to play.
\n\u201cThey knocked off one hell of a hockey team,\u201d said Tigers analyst Kevin Dean. \u201cThe Oakville Blades are a dynamite team\u2026I\u2019m sure we\u2019ll see them again down the road.\u201d
\nHead scout Jason Maslakow said this is \u201conly the start.\u201d
\n\u201cWith our third game in three nights, (we) persevered.\u201d
\nLast year\u2019s regular season conference champions are already playing up to their standards after being named just one of two Ontario teams named to the CJHL\u2019s top twenty pre-season rankings list, along with the Wellington Dukes. Aurora remains the only team in the NorthWest Conference to stay undefeated, while across the lines, the Cobourg Cougars are 4 \u2013 0 to start the season.
\nThe more experienced Jack Irvine got the call between the pipes for two of the Tigers three opening games, with 16-year old rookie Christian Filippetti getting the nod in game one. The 18-year old Irvine should shoulder the brunt of the load for the long and grueling season after seeing action in two dozen games with the Tigers last season.
\nThe Tigers will hope to keep their perfect streak going when they return to the ice on Friday, visiting the Pickering Panthers for the first match of the year between the divisional rivals.
\nThe next home game is scheduled for Saturday when the Tigers host the Trenton Golden Hawks, with puck drop scheduled for 7:30 p.m.
\nFor stats, schedules, and more information, visit www.auroratigers.pointstreaksites.com.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Same rivalry, new combatants.
\nThe first leg of the 2018-19 Battle of Yonge Street has decidedly gone to the Aurora Tigers, who…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":21627,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21623","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/2018-09-20-06.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-5CL","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-22 22:56:29","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21623","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21623\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21627"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}