For Soo Greyhounds defenceman Caeden Carlisle, it’s a night he’s going to remember for a long time.
The overage blueliner got the puck near the blueline and took a shot that beat Windsor Spitfires goaltender Joey Costanzo to give the Greyhounds an important win in their opening round Ontario Hockey League playoff series.
Carlisle called the winner the biggest goal he’s ever scored.
“I’ve never had an overtime goal in my career,” Carlisle said. “For sure the biggest goal of my life. I’m just happy to contribute.”
The goal gave the Greyhounds a 3-2 victory and the win comes after the Sault dropped the opening two games of the series in Windsor.
Monday was a game in which the Greyhounds showed an improvement over the first two games, which saw Windsor outscore the Sault by a 14-3 margin.,
“We were very good tonight,” Carlisle said. “Compete was good again. Physicality, we dominated that aspect.”
Heading into game four, Carlisle added that the importance now is not getting too high after Monday’s victory.
“Every game is its own story and this story’s over,” Carlisle said.
For Dean, he feels there’s a lot more to give, but he was overall pleased with the play of his team in the win.
“Better start for sure,” Dean said. “We have an opportunity to go up early if we capitalize on our chances in the first five or six minutes. We mismanaged the puck a little bit in the first period, but after that we settled in relatively nicely.”
“(Overall), I’m very happy,” Dean added, though he also said he feels as though the Greyhounds “haven’t played our best game yet.”
“That will be the bright side (Tuesday) is, there’s so much still to clean up and if we do clean it up, we can give Windsor an even better go,” Dean also said.
Windsor coach Greg Walters was pleased with the play of his team in the loss.
“We’re down a lot of guys, but we were excellent,” said Walters. “We hit the post in overtime. That’s hockey.”
Windsor opened the scoring as Carson Woodall took a shot from the left point that beat Greyhounds goaltender Nolan Lalonde high glove side through traffic at 8:28 of the opening period.
On the next shift, Windsor thought they took a 2-0 lead when Cole Davis took a breakaway pass from Jack Nesbitt and proceeded to beat Lalonde 5-hole, but the goal was waved off after a review due to a kicking motion on the goal.
In the second period, the Greyhounds tied the game at one thanks to a goal by Justin Cloutier. After giving the puck to Brady Martin, Cloutier took a return pass and beat Costanzo from the left faceoff circle high glove at 4:22.
The Greyhounds took a 2-1 lead in the third period thanks to a power play goal. Travis Hayes took a pass from Carson Andrew and beat Costanzo high stick side from the top of the right faceoff circle five minutes into the period to give the home team the lead.
Windsor forced the extra frame thanks to a goal with 20.2 seconds to go in regulation time from Liam Greentree. Parked in the right faceoff circle with Costanzo on the bench for an extra attacker, Greentree took a cross-ice pass from Ilya Protas and beat Lalonde to tie the game at two.
On the overtime winner, Carlisle took a shot from the point that found its way through traffic and beat Costanzo glove side to give the Greyhounds the win.
“Miggy (Marco Mignosa) walked up the wall and forced me to the middle, I got the puck and just thought, ‘get the puck to the net,’” Carlisle said of the winner.
Mignosa finished the night with a pair of assists for the Greyhounds.
Lalonde stopped 31 shots.
Dean called Lalonde “great” in the win.
“He gives our guys so much confidence, especially our younger guys, to continue to go out and play and make plays with the puck and not be scared,” Dean added. “That’s because he has so much poise in the net."
Costanzo stopped 30 shots for Windsor while Woodall had a goal and an assist offensively.
Game four is Wednesday night in the Sault before the series shifts back to Windsor for game five on Friday night.
Christopher Brown and Hunter Solomon, who missed game two due to injuries, sat out Monday’s contest.
Dean said he wasn’t “overly hopeful” that either would play on Wednesday night
With injuries already taking a toll on their lineup with veteran defenceman Tnias Mathurin and rookie Ethan Belchetz out longer term, defenceman Anthony Cristoforo and forward A.J. Spellacy missed Monday’s game for Windsor after injuries suffered in game two on Saturday.
Walters said following the game that both Cristoforo and Spellacy could potentially get back in the lineup for game four.
The Spitfires also lost forward Luke McNamara in the game due to injury.
Walters said his status wasn’t known following the game.