Ottawa, Ontario – The Ottawa Jr. Senators (15-7) defeated the Navan Grads (6-15-2), 4-2 on Sunday afternoon at the Navan Memorial Centre.
Prior to puck-drop, the Jr. Senators added Patrick Johnston to the roster. The twenty-year-old forward came down from NCAA D-3 Suny Plattsburgh and played his previous three years of junior in the QCHL.
Just eight minutes into the game, Johnston opened the scoring, as he found a lose puck in the crease and snapped it home for his first of two points in the win.
Head Coach Martin Dagenais says that adding Johnston to the roster creates internal competition.
“It was not a fit for him in Plattsburgh and he was looking for a place to play and we’re going to give him a shot,” said Martin. “For him to get a goal and an assist in his first game is a positive because he forces the other guys to go hard. It’s a good problem to have.”
Darcy Walsh finished the afternoon with two goals, giving him 17 goals on the season, which leads the league. Owen Cole tallied three assists. He now has two goals and three helpers in three games against Navan this year.
“He’s a good player, he has a lot of stuff to learn but that will make him even better. I told him before that he won’t play in the CCHL until he’s 20. He will probably has this year and next year. One Div. 1 team will get a really good player and I think it’s going to happen sooner rather than later,” added Dagenais.
Ottawa is now 2-1 against Navan in the season series. All three games have been decided by two goals or less.
Despite the individual performances by Johnston, Walsh and Cole – Dagenais says it was a full team effort.
“We competed hard, I don’t think the 4-2 score indicates how the game went. We had some good looks, we had some good chances but their goalie was very good. They’re a very tough team to beat in their barn so it’s a positive and we’ll take the win.”
To add to Ottawa’s solid team performance, Dagenais said that the game’s score could have been a lot higher if they would have scored a few more goals on the power-play, which went 1-8 in the win.
“If you score one more you’re 2-for-8, which is very good. We had a lot of looks, especially on the five-on-three but we could not execute at the end. For us it’s not really an issue and we’re going to keep working at it to make sure it get’s better.”
Heading into tomorrow’s morning contest against the Rockland Nationals, Martin Dagenais is still unsure how the lineup is going to look.
“We’re going to evaluate our roster in the next couple of weeks and see what type of changes we have to make to win hockey games but right now we’re very satisfied with the roster that we have so if we do make changes it will be minor changes.”
Puck-drop is set for 11:30 in Rockland as the Jr. Sens look for their third straight win against the Nationals. Mason Detre and Dante De Caria will have the call on mixlr.com/ojsradio.
