North London C2 Gets Gritty at Oakridge Tourney, News, North London C2, 2014-2015, HL-U9 (North London Nationals Hockey)

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This Team is part of the 2014-2015 season, which is not set as the current season.
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Feb 15, 2015 | Paul Murphy | 1601 views
North London C2 Gets Gritty at Oakridge Tourney
North London C2 showed they are ready for the upcoming playoffs by being the best London Team at this weekends Oakridge Novice Hockey Tournament. 

C2 lost in the Semi-Finals to the eventual Champs from Kitchener and was the only team in the tournament to score more than 1 goal on the Kitchener team - pumping four past them in the semi-final

North London C2 had a difficult opener against the Regular Season Champion and host team Oakridge B2.  The game was a defensive battle, although C2 definitely had more chances.  Nathan Blain, Liam Ironside, Noah Radbourne, and Carter Hughes repeatedly turned away the Aero's attack, clearing the puck efficiently. Finally, late in the third period, North London broke in on a 3 on 0 breakaway and Matt Murphy scored with just 12 seconds left to secure the 1-0 victory.  Jameson Roszel shut the door for his second shutout of the season.
In their second game, C2 got in an ole fashion barn burner with their nemesis West London C2.  Noah Radbourne had his best game of the season playing both forward and defence while contributing a goal and assist in the first two periods. This game is where Ben Siroen found his passing touch chipping in 2 assists.  These efforts all set the stage for more late game heroics from the C2 squad.  Nick Loupus tied the game at 3-3 with a beautiful goal from the high slot.  West C2 responded with 2 goals in 2 minutes to lead 5-3 with just under 3 minutes to play.  Morale was down on the North London bench as it appeared we were about to suffer a rare loss until the 3rd period kid - Matt Murphy, went down on two nice rushes to score twice and tie the game before time expired.  North London C2 was still alive!
Our third game was on the gigantic Crysler pad at the Western Fair against West London D2.  It took some time for our boys to get accustomed to the large playing surface.  This game saw the gun-slinging line of Sangster-Murphy-Loupos slowed to a halt.  Luckily we had contributions from others to carry us through to victory.  Noah Debicki made smart passes throughout the game and help set-up two goals, while Jerry Zakaria scored an important goal late in the 2nd to give us a 3-1 lead.  This huge rink, however, was the perfect size for our energizer bunny Ben Siroen who dominated at both ends of the ice recording a hat-trick while adding an assist on Jerry's goal.  We won 4-2 and advance to the elimination game for a grudge-match against West C2 again!
This elimination game was more of a defensive struggle and West London came to play.  Jameson held his ground and made some huge saves to keep us in the game as we were down 2-1 heading into the third period.  Jerry Zakaria scored yet another important goal to tie the game late in the third which set the stage for overtime.  The 3-on-3 overtime period called for Liam Ironside, Nick Loupos, and Matt Murphy to try to end the game early and propel us to the semi-finals.  Nick won the face-off and marched the puck deep into the West London zone.  West began to clear the zone but Liam held his line with a hard shot from the point.  The rebound found its way onto the stick of Murph, who fired a high and hard wrist-shot into the gaping net!  North London C2 was off to the Semi-Finals!
The Kitchener Coyotes stood in our path to Tournament Glory.  They were dominating the tournament outscoring their opponents 17-3 leading up to our match-up.  With a questionable roster of all-stars, we knew we would have our work cut out for us.  Before our boys could warm-up from the cold weather we found ourselves down 3-0 and then 4-1 after Nick Loupos got us on the board.  4-1 is how we entered the third period and things looked dim.  Liam Ironside was fighting off a cold and was moved up to forward to spark our offense.  Ben scored early in the third to close the gap to 2.  This marked the first time all tournament that a team got more than 1 goal past the Kitchener goalie.  The dirty Kitchener team started taking a lot of penalties and our powerplay went to work.  Nick Loupos continued his strong play setting Matt Murphy up for his 5th third period goal of the tournament.  We were within 1 goal.  Pressuring to tie the game, Daniel Sangster had his best chance of the season, firing a hard shot, with the Kitchener goalie stopping it just in time.  Unfortunately, the Kitchener scorers proved to be too much for us as the popped in two quick goals to all but put the game  away.  We are a third period team and the coaches were proud to see our boys not give up!  Carter and Nathan prevented anymore scoring chances and Noah Debicki made a nice pass up to Ben who made the score 6-4.  We pressed them for the remainder of the game put time expired.
Kitchener went on to win the final 4-1.  Their game against North C2 clearly their being their toughest challenge.  We are very pleased with how everyone played and we are excited for our playoff chances!!
Great Tournament Boys!!!