{"id":33908,"date":"2023-12-07T19:01:13","date_gmt":"2023-12-08T00:01:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=33908"},"modified":"2023-12-14T17:17:51","modified_gmt":"2023-12-14T22:17:51","slug":"rangers-ruin-school-day-revelry-while-muskies-and-golden-hawks-deepen-the-tigers-sea-of-troubles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/rangers-ruin-school-day-revelry-while-muskies-and-golden-hawks-deepen-the-tigers-sea-of-troubles\/","title":{"rendered":"Rangers ruin \u2018School Day\u2019 revelry while Muskies and Golden Hawks deepen the Tigers\u2019 \u201cSea of Troubles\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Prince Hamlet, during one of his darker moments, asked \u201cWhether \u2018tis nobler in the mind to suffer \/ The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune \/ Or to take arms against a sea of troubles.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s unlikely the tragic Dane had the suffering Aurora Tigers in mind when he uttered these famous words, but it\u2019s a fitting assessment of the \u201csea of troubles\u201d and \u201coutrageous fortune\u201d challenging the Town\u2019s Junior A hockey team.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three losses this week\u20147-5 to the North York Rangers on Tuesday afternoon in front of 886 school kids at the ACC, a tough luck 2-1 OT loss in Lindsay on Friday night, and a 4-0 defeat to the high-flying Trenton Golden Hawks on home ice on Saturday night\u2014have dropped the Tigers into 11th place in the OJHL\u2019s 12-team East Conference.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Saturday night\u2019s loss did reveal a marked improvement by the Tigers versus the first-place Golden Hawks.  Exactly one month ago, the two teams faced each other at the ACC and Trenton mauled Aurora 9-3 in what could be considered the Tigers\u2019 poorest performance of the season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Saturday night, the Tigers put forth a \u201cnoble\u201d effort against the #2 team in the OJHL, demonstrating a marked improvement in forechecking and taking away space from the Golden Hawks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tigers\u2019 Head Coach Tom Milne acknowledged the improved performance of his club against one of the top Junior A teams in Canada.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe improvement we saw tonight is in the structure we have been able to put into our game and the work ethic is way better.  All I can ask is that they continue to play harder so we can compete.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tigers\u2019 goaltender Will Goumas competed masterfully for his team and \u201ctook arms [and stick and catching glove and chest protector] against a sea of troubles\u201d caused by the gargantuan Golden Hawks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Goumas held Trenton off the scoreboard until the 8:46 mark of the second period when Lucas Lepalm chipped a rebound into the top left corner of the cage over the fallen Tigers\u2019 netminder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The power play goal gave the visitors a 1-0 lead. Goumas, coming off a great game in Lindsay on Friday night in which he stopped 25 of 27 shots to help the Tigers earn a point on the road in an OT loss, performed heroically between the pipes on Saturday, stopping 28 of 30 shots he faced in the first two periods versus Trenton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coach Milne praised his big, athletic goaltender: \u201cWill was really good last night in Lindsay. I know he\u2019d like to have back two of those goals he gave up tonight, but he was good for us tonight, too, especially in the first two periods.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With twenty-three seconds left in the second period, Cooper Matthews\u2019s wrist shot eluded Goumas to give Trenton a 2-0 lead. 80 seconds into the third period, Lepalm scored his second of the evening and the talented Golden Hawk forward completed his hat trick ten minutes later when he banged in a rebound behind Goumas, hence providing Trenton\u2019s four-goal margin of victory. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Adding to \u201cthe sea of troubles\u201d for the Tigers is a growing injury list as Assistant Captain Connor Russo and Hard-Shooting Defenseman Luke Hampel  suffered upper body injuries in Lindsay\u2014and Aurora\u2019s Captain Keegan Decaluwe left Saturday night\u2019s game early and was hospitalized due to another upper body injury. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Russo, Hampel, and Decaluwe played in Friday\u2019s night\u2019s narrow loss in Lindsay, another \u201cnoble\u201d effort by the Tigers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aurora carried a 1-0 lead into the second intermission, propelled by Goumas\u2019s fine play in net and Josh Frenette\u2019s first goal as a Tiger since coming over in a blockbuster trade last week from the Toronto Junior Canadiens.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coach Milne complimented Frenette\u2019s second period power play marker as \u201can excellent deflection\u201d of Liam Longo\u2019s shot. The power forward\u2019s goal stood up until 2:33 of the final frame when Brandon Nye\u2019s power play goal pulled the Muskies into a 1-1 tie and sent the game into overtime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ethan Walker\u2019s goal at 15:39 of the extra period caused the Tigers to \u201csuffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune\u201d in a tough overtime loss to a divisional rival\u2014a defeat worsened by the injuries of key Tigers like Russo and Hampel. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This week\u2019s \u201csea of troubles\u201d for the Tigers started on Tuesday afternoon.  Despite the positive energy of 886 fans packed into the ACC for the annual School Game, the Tigers produced an uneven effort versus the last-place North York Rangers and \u201csuffered an outrageous\u201d 7-5 loss. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Tigers never led in the \u201cSchool Day Game,\u201d although they tied the contest 5-5 in the third period on power play goals sixteen seconds apart by Keegan Decaluwe and Liam Longo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The home side had a golden opportunity to pull ahead of the Rangers when Hudson Weger drew a major penalty and game misconduct for checking from behind as he tried to drive Tiger Kenny Wu through the south end boards of the ACC.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The school kids chanted \u201cRangers Suck\u201d after this egregious infraction\u2014hence showing their hockey IQ \u2013 and broke out into a \u201cGo Tigers Go\u201d cheer that rocked the old building.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alas, the Tigers did not tally their sixth goal on the five-minute power play and, to deepen the tragedy, Ranger Alexey Kulikow stepped behind two Aurora defenders on a bad ricochet and scored the go-ahead goal with 4:48 left in the final frame to put the visitors ahead 6-5.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSlings and arrows\u201d, indeed, for the school kids and the Tigers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a disappointing denouement, Peter Smith scored the Rangers\u2019 seventh goal into an empty net with 41 ticks left on the clock.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFie on it!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Tigers sent over 880 school kids to their awaiting buses disappointed that the home side couldn\u2019t eke out a win on a Tuesday afternoon, despite outshooting the Rangers 54-29. North York netminder Matteo Porporino caused most of the \u201csea of suffering\u201d for the Tigers, making 49 saves during the matinee matchup. Porporino was absolutely larcenous during the Rangers\u2019 five-minute penalty kill in the third period and was voted OJHL First Star of the Game. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two goals that eluded Porporino belonged to Tigers\u2019 leading scorer and OJHL Second Star of the Game Ryan Evenhuis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Assistant Captain\u2019s power play goal at 5:22 of the second period tied the game at 2-2 and his second goal 26 seconds into the third period narrowed the North York lead to 4-3. Evenhuis\u2019s goals were his 18th and 19th of the season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The OJHL Top Ten scorer is a bright light for his hockey club, amid \u2018the sea of troubles\u2019 the Tigers have faced during this tragic season. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Tigers (10-20-2-2) will seek a doubleheader sweep next weekend to get back in the playoff race with home games versus the Haliburton County Huskies (14-13-2-0) on Friday, December 8 and the Leamington Flyers (18-8-3-0) on Saturday, December 9.\u00a0 Puck drop for both games at the ACC is 7.30 p.m.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Jim Stewart<\/strong><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Prince Hamlet, during one of his darker moments, asked \u201cWhether \u2018tis nobler in the mind to suffer \/ The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune \/ Or to take arms against a sea of troubles.\u201d It\u2019s unlikely the tragic Dane had the suffering Aurora Tigers in mind when he uttered these famous words, but it\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"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":[24,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-sports","category-sports"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-8OU","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-18 11:18:06","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\/33908","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=33908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33908\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}