The Lakehead Thunderwolves defeated the Toronto Varsity Blues 7-5 in an exciting back-and-forth contest at Varsity Arena on the University of Toronto campus Friday night.
Toronto jumped to an early lead when Connor Cleverly fired the puck past Lakehead goalie Justin McDonald just 1:10 into the game.
Mike Hammond tied the score at the 17:52 mark of the first period when he beat Toronto netminder Garrett Sheehan, with the assists going to Jay Gilbert and Keith Grondin. But with only 34 seconds remaining in the period, Tyler Liukkonen gave the Varsity Blues the 2-1 lead heading into the second.
Toronto outshot Lakehead 17-11 in the opening 20 minutes of play.
Lakehead stormed back with three quick goals to start the second period, beginning with an unassisted effort by freshman Austin McDonald at 3:31.
Grondin got the go-ahead goal for the Wolves less than a minute later after being set up by Mike Quesnele and Kelin Ainsworth, and then Jake Wright made it 4-2 for Lakehead at 6:33, with Luke Maw and Jake Carrick picking up the assists.
Toronto took advantage of a power play opportunity when Michael Markovic narrowed the gap to 4-3 to round out the scoring in the middle frame at the 10:25 mark.
Shots on goal in the second period were 15-7 in favor of the Varsity Blues.
Mitch Fillman restored the Wolves two-goal lead just 40 seconds into the third period while Lakehead had the man-advantage, with the assists credited to Hammond and Grondin.
Torontos Joshua Villaflor scored at 2:53 to close the gap to 5-4, but Ainsworth replied for the Thunderwolves after receiving a nice feed from Austin McDonald to make it 6-4 Lakehead at 12:06.
The Varsity Blues wouldnt go away quietly, and Paul Van de Velde brought Toronto back to within one goal with a drive that got past Justin McDonald with less than five minutes to go.
Hammond iced the game for the Wolves with his second goal of the night, an empty-netter set up by Grondin and Maw with just 30 seconds left in the game.
The Varsity Blues put 14 shots on the Lakehead goal in the final stanza for a three-period total of 46, while the Thunderwolvesreplied with 9 to tally 27 shots for the game.
The Wolves will remain in the downtown Toronto area to take on the Ryerson Rams Saturday afternoon at 2:00 p.m.