The Huntsville Hawks find themselves in a familiar position. They will almost certainly finish fourth in the Ontario Jr. C East Division standings and if they get by their first round they will be up against the highly regarded Clarington team in the second round. It would be the third straight year that has happened with Clarington having Huntsville’s number up until now.
This scenario unfolded Saturday night when the Hawks dropped a 14-7 game to the Peterborough Lakers at the Jack Bionda arena. It was the Hawks’ final game of the regular season finishing with nine wins and seven losses. The Hawks had won the night before in Barrie 22-8. While it is a winning record, and some positives can be taken from that, it is well short of the pre-season goal the team had set for itself which was 12 wins and four losses.
The Hawks now expect to play Cornwall in a best of three series.
The Hawks dug themselves a deep hole in the first period against the Lakers falling behind 6-0. They pulled to within three goals in the second but that’s as close as they would get all night losing the game 14-7.
Captain Chris McLaughlin had three goals while Luke Allen and Tyler Conn added two each.
McLaughlin’s performance was a little revenge after he was slashed in the first period by Peterborough defenceman Andrew Brown. Brown received a major and minor penalty for slashing and an additional minor for wearing illegal equipment. He was also tossed from the game.
The incident became more ugly when both benches shouted obscenities at each other while exiting the floor at the end of the period.
A discussion before the second period among the coaches and referees seemed to calm things down.
Huntsville coach Joe O’Halloran was clearly disappointed with the result and again pointed to the fact his team, while sporting a winning record, has lacked consistency throughout the year.
We need to find a way to play sixty minutes of lacrosse in the playoffs if we hope to have any success. We killed ourselves. As a coaching staff we believe in these players but sometimes they don’t believe in themselves.
Coach Joe O’Halloran
The Hawks have a week to prepare for the playoffs and try to find that consistency of play. Their opening game with Cornwall will be the following week in Huntsville. The Hawks have the home-floor advantage finishing ahead of the Celtics, although the two teams exchanged victories away from home.
“It’s going to be hard work and determination that will decide the series,” said O’Halloran. “We need to keep focused and have a couple of tough practices. We have four or five guys putting up the points every night and we need more. We just can’t dig another hole.”
“We call Cornwall the lunchbox team, lunch box and work boots. They just come and play hard. They’re not flashy, not one big goal scorer. They’re going to come and they’re going to grind and it’s going to come down to the will to win.”
“So the fun begins. It’s playoff time and anything can happen. It’s a four five matchup (standings) we didn’t want to be here but we are. We made this bed and hopefully are going to come out on top.”
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