Markham continued their modest winning streak,
scoring on the first shift and never looking back in a 10-2 victory over Ajax
in the final meeting of the regular season between the two teams. The Waxers
put on an offensive clinic pounding 60 shots at the two Axemen tenders during
the game. B.J. Van Mierlo started and was victorious in his first ever
game in Markham, stopping 30 shots along the way.
Patrick Diotte got things rolling only 35
seconds in to the game with an unassisted goal on a wrist shot from the blue
line that somehow eluded the Axemen goalie. Another Diotte point shot
just under 6 minutes later produced the second goal when after the shot
striking the post, Pat Porretta scooped up the rebound and stuffed it home for
the 2-0 lead. The Waxers upped it to 3-0 on a Jesse Boucher powerplay
goal midway through the period. After receiveing an pass from Jason
Duffy, Boucher stepped of the halfboards and let a slapper go that beat the
goalie, low to the glove side.
The second period saw the Waxers Derek Doucette
score the 4th goal for Markham. After Jason Young found Doucette alone in
front, Doucette's high hard wrister beat the Axemen goalie (they had switched
at this point) for his 14th of the year. Ajax would bust the shutout just
over 7 minutes in and then cut the lead to 4-2 with a powerplay goal at the
12:30 mark. Markham rounded out the second period scoring with Matt Neely
scoring his first goal since his return to the Waxers. Strong
forechecking by Mark Skeels and
Michael Fish allowed Fish to center the puck to
Neely and his blast caught nothing but twine for the 5-2 lead.
For the second straight game, the Waxers were
able to score 5 goals in the third and put the game to bed, starting with Ben
Cottreau's marker at the 5:28 mark. Duffy lead the break through the
neutral zone and dropped the puck for Cottreau who used the defenseman as the
perfect screen, roofing a wrist shot from the top of the circles. That was
followed shortly after by Neely's second of the night, a low wrister from the
blueline after being set up by some nifty stickhandling of
Doucette's. Fish then scored the second powerplay marker for the
Waxers finishing off a pretty three-way passing play started by Duffy and
Cottreau that saw the Axemen players and goalie sliding the wrong way leaving
Fish the empty net. Kevin Cribari
and Michael Diamond hooked up on the Waxers 9th
goal, and Boucher then scored the tenth goal after an end-to-end rush with
Doucette and Ryan Steane picking up assists.
With the win the Waxers guaranteed themselves
at least a share of third place in the South Conference with 53 points and sets
the stage for their final 3 games, two of which are against potential first
round playoff opponents.
G A M
E S U M M A R Y |
PERIOD
1
1. Markham, Diotte 8 0:25 5x5
2. Markham, Porretta 21 (Diotte) 6:11 5x5
3. Markham, Boucher 45 (Duffy) 9:14 PP 5x4 GWG
PENALTIES:
Doucette MW (roughing) 0:50, Smyth AA (high
sticking) 4:10, Smyth AA (holding) 8:49, Cribari MW (cross
checking) 16:26PERIOD
2
4. Markham, Doucette 14 (Young) 2:09 5x5
5. Ajax, Watters (Darlow, Tomiuk) 7:18 5x5
6. Ajax, McConnachie (Wyles, McGregor) 12:30 PP 5x4
7. Markham, Neely 1 (Skeels, Fish) 13:21 5x5
PENALTIES: Skeels MW
Taylor AA (slashing) 2:49, Pain MW McGregor AA (roughing) 9:03,
Doucette MW (cross checking) 11:43, Grasso MW (head checking, game
misconduct) Root AA (roughing) 14:00, Skeels MW (slashing,
fighting, game misconduct) Taylor AA (fighting, game misconduct)
14:04, Wyles AA (holding) 14:43 PERIOD
3
8. Markham, Cottreau 16 (Duffy) 5:28 5x5
9. Markham, Neely 2 (Doucette) 7:04 5x5
10. Markham, Fish 10 (Duffy, Cottreau) 12:20 PP 5x4
11. Markham, Cribari 13 (Diamond) 13:02 5x5
12. Markham, Boucher 46 (Doucette, Steane) 18:14 5x5
PENALTIES:
Boucher
MW (spearing) 1:11, Morgan AA (roughing) 10:25, Pain MW Mitchell
AA (roughing) 14:03, Kleine MW McGregor AA (roughing) 16:48 GOALTENDERS:
Markham: B.J. Van Mierlo, Ajax: Chris Wood (0-20:00, 34:00-60:00),
Craig Neilsen (20:00-34:00) |
SHOTS ON
GOAL |
P1 |
P2 |
P3 |
OT |
FINAL |
AJAX
AXEMEN |
8 |
15 |
9 |
- |
32 |
MARKHAM
WAXERS |
23 |
17 |
20 |
- |
60 |
|