Staff
The Fort Frances Jr. Sabres couldn’t gain ground on the Thunder Bay Bearcats over the weekend.
The Sabres (20-11-2) lost back-to-back games by identical 4-2 scores to fall seven points behind the Bearcats (22-7-5) for second place in the SIJHL standings.
Brad Pawlowski had a goal and three assists to pace the host Bearcats’ attack on Friday night while newcomer Tyler Miller added three assists.
Jeff Manryk netted two goals and Graeme McCormack the other for the home side while Kyle Turgeon and Mitch Cain replied with power-play goals for the Sabres.
Saturday night’s game featured more of the same as the Bearcats fired 57 shots on Sabres’ goalie Ryan Faragher and led 3-0 midway through the game.
The Sabres battled back to make a game of it, but fell short despite his second goal in as many nights from Turgeon late in the third.
Miller added two goals and an assist for another three-point game, and now has 33 points in just 12 games since being acquired from the Port Hope Predators.
Brooks Mejia and Manryk had the others for the Bearcats while Graham Dyck netted the Sabres’ other goal.
The Sabres were without first-line winger Colton Kennedy for both games, but head coach Wayne Strachan said the effort level simply wasn’t good enough.
“I am not going to make excuses about depleted lineups or injuries,” Strachan stressed. “We still iced a good, competitive team but we didn’t play that way in either game.
“You can argue that we were tired from three-games-in-three-nights, but we didn’t lose the games in the third period,” he added. “We lost the games because the effort wasn’t there.”
The Sabres next host Schreiber this Thursday and Friday.
