Oshawa's captain Stuart Rolofs has goals in back-to-back games as the OHL Eastern Conference Finals shifts to North Bay for games 3 and 4
It was a slow start for Oshawa to the Eastern Conference Championship Series in front of their home crowd. Game one took place on Friday where North Bay struck quickly, scoring two goals four and a half minutes into the contest. No surprise by the goal scorers as it was their two offensive catalysts in the post-season Sandis Vilmanis and Dalyn Wakely.
The Battalion didn't do themselves any favours with a 2-0 lead, taking four straight penalties and allowing Oshawa's captain Stuart Rolofs to score his first of two in the game.
2024 NHL draft-eligible defender Luca Marrelli buried the game-winning goal early in the third period. The Generals took game one 4-2.
Game 2:
North Bay's captain Liam Arnsby finished serving his six-game suspension and was added back in the lineup for game two, centering a line between Justin Ertel and Sandis Vilmanis.
Battalion head coach Ryan Oulahen on how important it is to have Arnsby back in the lineup, "He's such a massive hole out of our lineup. Give the guys credit in the room, we haven't had him for the last six games. Guys have dug deep. They've adopted a bit of a style that we kind of had to get through in that time."
"He's a guy for me that's going to play in a lot of different scenarios, different minutes. And I just think matching up against Oshawa, we need him to add that depth especially in our top three lines."
There's a saying in hockey, "Getting pucks on net is never a bad thing." That must've been what Minnesota Wild second-rounder Rasmus Kumpulainen was thinking when he floated a wrister towards the net which somehow got by everyone to open the scoring for Oshawa.
The Generals went to their fourth powerplay of the game late in the second period where they finally capitalized on a Calum Ritchie shot that deflected off of Stuart Rolofs and past McIvor.
Rolofs had only scored one goal in the playoffs before the start of this series. After game one, he told the media following his two-goal performance, "I don't really care about individual statistics, I only care about winning games."
With the home side up 2-0 and an opportunity to take the first two games of the series, North Bay needed a strong push in the third period.
However, you would've thought Oshawa was down 2-0 as they outshot North Bay 20-3 in the final frame. It was a defensive clinic by the Gens. The Battalion struggled to cleanly enter the offensive zone and get shots through onto Oster.
Jacob Oster recorded his second shutout of the playoffs stopping all 22 shots he faced.
"They've been great in front of me. They've been making life easy and just keeping everything simple. Like you said it's a team award, it's not just myself so big credit goes to them." Oster said to the media after game two about the team play in front of him.
The Eastern Conference Championship Series now shifts its way to North Bay where the 0-2 Battalion will look to feast off the "7th Man" home crowd to get back into this series.
Puck drop for game three is at 7pm EST.
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