North Bay won the first game of the series, but Kingston put up a fight against the Battalion. However, star player Anthony Romani was injured after scoring the game’s first goal.
In the first game of their best-of-seven Ontario Hockey League Eastern Conference quarterfinal series, the North Bay Battalion defeated the Kingston Frontenacs 4-2 on Thursday night. Ty Nelson and Justin Ertel both finished with one goal and one assist.
Anthony Romani and Dalyn Wakely also scored and Sandis Vilmanis earned two assist for the Troops who host Game 2 at 7 p.m. on Saturday. Goaltender Dom DiVincentiis faced 27 shots before a Memorial Gardens crowd of 3,042. DiVincentiis earned his 14th career playoff win, moving him past Thomas McCollum and into sole possession of second place on the club’s all-time list.
Jacob Battaglia and Quinton Burns scored for the Frontenacs who got 23 saves from goaltender Mason Vaccari
The Battalion had a 1-0 lead after a scrappy first period.
Romani opened the scoring at 10:18. Owen Van Steensel collected a long pass from Nelson and dropped the puck to Romani who blasted a shot that Vaccari kicked away with his right pad. Romani gathered his own rebound and slid the puck home from a sharp angle to the goaltender’s right for his first goal of the playoffs. Romani left the game after the goal and did not return.
The Troops held an 11-7 edge in shots. Ertel had two good close chances late after missing the top corner with Vaccari down in his crease in the 14th minute. The Frontenacs, who didn’t record a shot until midway through the frame, had their best chance on the power play when DiVincentiis denied Battaglia at the left post in the 17th minute.
Bronson Ride and Nathan Poole engaged in a brief fight out of a scrum at 6:34 that ended with Ride getting the takedown.
Battaglia tied the game 21 seconds into the second period as he drove the net and steered a Christopher Thibodeau feed through DiVincentiis’s pads.
Defenceman Nelson restored the Battalion’s lead at 5:47, 12 seconds after the expiration of a North Bay power play when his low drive from the blue line beat a screened Vaccari. The goal, assisted by Wyatt Kennedy and Ertel, was Nelson’s first of the playoffs and marked his 37th career postseason point, tying him with Brenden Miller for fourth on the Troops’ all-time list.
Wakely made it 3-1 at 15:19, cruising across the goalmouth and steering a lofty pass from Paul Christopoulos past Vaccari for his first of the playoffs. Vilmanis earned the second assist.
Kingston outshot the Troops 12-5 with the bulk of their shots coming during a power play late in the period.
The Frontenacs once again struck in the first minute of a period when Burns beat DiVincentiis high to the glove side at 41 seconds of the third.
The visitors had several excellent chances in the fifth minute. Jax Dubois’s shot off a left-wing rush hit the cross bar, prompting a brief video review, and DiVincentiis was called on to make good stops in close in succession on Battaglia and Thibodeau. Gage Heyes had a good chance off the left wing in the 12th minute and Ethan Midema missed an excellent opportunity from the left-wing circle in the 18th.
Vaccari went to the bench for a sixth skater with 1:52 left in the period. Ertel finished the scoring into an empty net at 18:53 with Vilmanis earning the lone assist on Ertel’s first goal of the postseason.
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