Joey Payeur
Wayne Strachan turned line juggling—and blueline and goalie juggling, for that matter—into an art form on Tuesday night.
With injuries, illness, and suspensions leaving him with only 11 forwards, five defencemen, and one semi-healthy netminder, the Fort Frances Lakers’ head coach and general manager played mix-and-match on offence, defence, and in goal.
But the new combinations had a familiar result as the Lakers hit the 40-win mark with a 5-2 victory over the visiting English River Miners.
“When it rains, it pours,” Strachan grimaced about his somewhat decimated roster for the game against the Miners, who now have dropped four-straight and nine of their last 10.
“I was trying to be as fair as I could with ice time,” he added.
With forwards Nolan Ross and Donovan Cousineau, along with defenceman Gordon Campbell, already unavailable, the Lakers took two more lineup hits before the game.
Team scoring leader Mason Meyer sat out as a precaution (he was scheduled to be checked today for a possible concussion).
Blueliner A.J. Kapcheck, meanwhile, was serving a one-game suspension after fighting in the last 10 minutes of the third period of Saturday night’s 4-2 win over the Thunder Bay North Stars.
“It was an opportunity for some guys to get more ice time than they would with a regular lineup,” noted Strachan, who was back behind the bench Tuesday night after missing Saturday’s game due to his son being ill.
“We rotated the centres in the first, the left-wingers in the second, and the right-wingers in the third,” he said.
“But I like how we controlled the game and it wasn’t too hard for the players to adjust.”
The first-place Lakers (40-10-0-1) opened the scoring midway through the first when Dylan Kooner made a drop pass to Wyatt Cota, who sent it right back to Kooner for an easy tap-in.
Hank Bouchard tied it for the Miners just over two minutes later, but Matt Vela cashed in a Dylan Robertson rebound later in the period to put the Lakers back on top.
During a delayed penalty in the second, Cody Antonini’s point shot was tipped in by Robertson.
The Lakers added two more in third—sandwiching power-play goals by Bryson Jasper and Cota around a breakaway goal by Layne Anderson on a great long-bomb stretch pass from former Laker George Roblin.
“It’s fun playing with different guys,” said Jasper.
“It changes things up every shift.”
“It doesn’t matter who is in the lineup or out,” stressed Cota.
“We’re capable of beating anyone.”
Even the netminders got into the act Tuesday night.
Pierce Dushenko started and made 10 saves before giving way after the first period to Nathan Park, who had 12 over the final two periods.
That was Strachan’s plan all along—just in reverse.
“Nathan was supposed to start and Pierce play the last two,” he noted.
“But Nathan tweaked his knee a bit in practice and so we started Pierce.
“Then Pierce got feeling sick after the first and Nathan was healthy enough to step in,” Strachan added.
English River head coach and GM Kevin Kahoot was dealing with his own case of nausea after what he called a disappointing effort by his team.
“We must have left our legs on the bus because there was no energy,” he remarked.
“There was no forecheck or backcheck—it’s probably lucky we didn’t get a power-play so that we could see how bad it was, too.
“We took a step backwards tonight,” Kahoot added.
The two teams will go back at it tomorrow night in Ear Falls before the Lakers continue their road trip Saturday against the Dryden GM Ice Dogs.
Their next home game goes Tuesday (March 10) at 7:30 p.m. against the Minnesota Iron Rangers.
