By Matt Wilson
Ottawa, ON – The Ottawa Jr. Senators officially clinched a berth in the 2020 CCHL Playoffs with a massive 5-3 win over the Smiths Falls Bears on Saturday night at the Jim Durrell Sports Complex.
Both teams came into the game with a must win mentality as a win for the Jr. Senators would have them leapfrog Smiths Falls into 5th place in the CCHL’s standings.
The Bears opened the scoring early as the dynamite line of Tate Leeson, Theo Todd and Noah Adams converted early as Adams slid his 9th goal of the season past Bryan Landsberger to give the Bears an early lead.
The Jr. Senators line of Josh Shimizu, David Berube and Christophe Cote was dominate all night and they opened the scoring 4:52 into the 1st Period as Cote buried his first of two goals on the night finishing a great scoring chance from Josh Shimizu.
“It was our first game playing together” said Christophe Cote on his line with Josh Shimizu and Davide Berube. “We practiced all week together though and I think we are three pretty good players, capable of playing in both the offensive and defensive zone, and overall we gelled pretty well together”
Josh Shimizu and Thomas Freel added two other goals for OJS in the first period to give the team a 3-1 lead heading into the 2nd.
Former Jr. Senator Brent Broaders scored his 17th of the season and recorded his 21st point in his 22nd game since joining the Bears to get Smiths Falls within a goal, before Owen Cole fed Vincent Velocci with a beautiful cross crease pass shorthanded which Velocci buried to give Ottawa a two goal lead once again, something they would never look back from.
OJS Head Coach Martin Dagenais liked the teams effort overall in the win.
“We had some good moments” said Dagenais. “I loved the start for us in the first twenty minutes, I thought we were all over them, I didn’t like the first seven or eight minutes in the second period but then we got going once again, the third period was tough with a lot of power plays and PK’s but we got the job done in the end”
The Jr. Senators are back in action Sunday night for another big match up in terms of the standings as they make the trip down highway 7 to Pembroke to take on the Lumber Kings for a 7:00 pm start. Mason Detre and Matt Wilson will have the call on mixlr.com/ojsradio starting with a 6:50 pre game.
