ESPANOLA, Ont. – A couple of Blake Peters-Davey markers, including one on a second period penalty shot, helped propel the Espanola Paper Kings past the French River Rapids 5-1 Sunday afternoon in Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League play at the Regional Recreation Complex.
A red-hot Owen Fergusson kept his tremendous offensive pace on the go for Espanola by blocking a shot and going in alone on a breakaway, where despite stumbling briefly along the way, regained his balance and snapped a shot by French River goalkeeper Elijah Grant, 6:21 into the contest.
The tally gives the NOJHL’s leading scorer points in 11 straight outings, as well as in 17 of his past 18 games.
Adding to their lead 10 minutes later, Paper Kings defenceman Sean Short sent a rising shot from the point that sailed into the top right hand corner over Grant’s glove.
Adding to their edge in the middle stanza, Short sent a feed across to Grant Booth going down the left wing where he wired it in.
A fourth Espanola effort came at 11:32, via the penalty shot, after Peters-Davey was taken down on a break.
On his opportunity, Peters-Davey skated in slowly, then made a couple of moves before neatly picking the bottom left corner.
He then added another three minutes later after being nicely set-up by Fergusson along the right side.
A late man advantage helped French River get on the board on a play that Sergy Suschenko took around the net and banked in off a defender past a sprawled Jake Marois at 19:21.
There would be no further scoring the rest of the way.
With the result, the Paper Kings move to 24-13-0-0 overall and in defeat, the Rapids slip to 8-28-0-1.
The two teams will meet again Thursday in a 7 p.m. start at Noelville Arena and on FLOHockey.tv.
