An outstanding effort in an intense battle on the road produced a winning result in Etobicoke for the Wellington Dukes on Saturday night.
The Dukes defeated the Toronto Patriots 5-2 to improve to .500 at 4-4 on the season, squeezing out a victory despite ending the game without four players against a team that only lost once prior to this game.
Wellington opened the scoring when Ben Vreugdenhil won a faceoff and went straight to the net to deposit a shot home from Riley Noble that hit the crossbar and bounced on his stick.
The Dukes played one man short for most of the night after a Quinn McNamara major penalty for head contact on Keegan Driscoll.
Another infraction on that extended penalty kill triggered a Toronto goal, with Brice Cooke one-timing a Lucas Vacca feed through Jack Lisson to even the score.
A goaltending change ensued late in the first after a collision between Tyler Tsoukalas and Toronto goalie Braeden Shaikh resulted in the latter being taken out in favour of Alex Levshyn.
Jared McNeil put Wellington ahead late in a tight second period, waltzing to the slot and wiring one top shelf on Levshyn from Zack Carrier and Vreugdenhil.
A collision in the Toronto crease early in the third set off a mini brouhaha that involved Zach Mascard, Cole Ellis and Cory Jewitt all incurring five-minute majors and game misconducts.
Without their key players, Wellington pushed through and increased the lead to two when Carrier and Sacha Trudel set up Logan Klaiber for an open look on a double minor powerplay opportunity.
Klaiber’s second of the season ended up standing as the game-winner, as Wellington weathered a Patriots storm and a marker by Cole Emerton with 2:50 left on the clock to finish the game on top.
Ryan Schaap and Trudel iced the game with empty netters to round out the scoring.
Trudel, McNeil, Carrier and Vreugdenhil all ended with two-point games in the victory.
Lisson made 33 saves, as the shots were even 35 apiece.
Coming out of the fire, the Dukes will be thrown into the deep end again when they return home next Sunday after a week break from game action to face the defending OJHL and Centennial Cup champion Collingwood Blues.
The puck drop will be at 2:30 p.m. at Lehigh Arena.
