Knights dominate 67’s in 11-1 victory

It was a battle between first and the worst at Scotiabank Place tonight.  With a whopping 46 points separating these two teams in the Ontario Hockey League standings, one could only predict the outcome.

Chris Tierney and Max Domi each scored a hat trick to lead their London Knights to an 11-1 thrashing of the Ottawa 67’s in front of a hometown Ottawa crowd of 3,414.  Bo Horvat and Dakota Mermis also tallied 4 points on the night.

Two hat tricks, two short-handed goals, a short-handed/penalty-shot goal and 4 powerplay goals – all allowed – sums up the night the 67’s will like to forget.

It didn’t take long for the Knights to open the scoring.  Chris Tierney picked up his first of the night with a long shot from the top of the faceoff circle beating Clint Windsor just over 1 minute into the opening frame.  Tierney would pick up his second of the night off a nice give and go play with Dakota Mermis.  The wrist shot beat Windsor blocker side on the powerplay. 

A 5-minute major for checking to the head would send Ottawa to their first powerplay of the game.  Corey Pawley caught Mark Petaccio with a high hit in centre ice.  He also received a game misconduct and could face supplementary discipline.  Petaccio was not injured on the play.

A sharp angle shot and a wide open cage gave the 67’s their only goal of the game as Brett Gustavsen quickly took advantage of his opportunity on the powerplay. 

Less than one minute later, the Knights would strike again.  A blocker save ricochet off Domi’s shoulder and into the net to regain the Knights two goal cushion.

Despite the score, it was a sloppy period for both teams who seemed uninterested for the opening twenty minutes.  London led the shot clock 14-6 while Ottawa only registered their first shot at the 9:58 mark.

The second period didn’t start out any better for the 67’s.  Less than 40 seconds in, Bo Horvat fed a crisp cross-ice pass to Tyler Perry who made no mistake and one-time it into the back of the net for the Knights’ first short-handed tally.  Horvat would pick up his own goal 4 minutes later sliding the puck past Windsor and chasing him from the net after allowing 5 goals on 17 shots.

Seth Griffith picked up his team leading 30^th goal of the season off a penalty shot after being hauled down the rookie Dante Salituro.  The goal was also considered a short-handed goal as the Knights were killing a penalty.  Shots in the second were 14-4 in favour of the Knights.

The Knights woke up in the third period and really started to pour things onto the 67’s.  Domi scored a pair of goals while Horvat, Tierney and Josh Anderson combined for three goals in the final frame.  Knights skate to an easy 11-1 win snapping an uncharacteristic 3-game losing streak.

The 67’s are in Kingston tomorrow night and will try to snap their own losing skid of 6 straight games.