London Knights northern road trip begins with 5-2 loss in North Bay

Ryder Carey scored twice as the North Bay Battallion came out charging and handed the London Knights a 5-2 defeat at the Boart Longyear Memorial Gardens on Nov. 20.

The game was the first of three in three nights as London goes through North Bay, Sudbury and Sault Ste. Marie.

The Battalion came out flying and scored two goals in the first 3:33 of the game.

The first came lightning fast off a faceoff when North Bay’s Ryder Carey ripped a wrist shot over the glove of Aleksei Medvedev at the 1:31 mark of the first period.

Just over two minutes later, Anaheim Ducks prospect Ethan Procyszyn stole a puck after a Battalion dump in and fed Lirim Amidovski at the edge of the London crease for what ended up being a tap-in and a 2-0 North Bay lead.

Knights captain Sam O’Reilly started a rush that cut that lead in half at the 6:18 mark as he took a hard hit inside the London blue line but managed to make a pass to Ben Wilmott in centre ice that sent Wilmott and Braidy Wassilyn ahead on a two-one-one.

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Wilmott fed Wassilyn and the former Niagara IceDog scored his seventh goal as a Knight and 10th goal of the season to make it a 2-1 North Bay lead.

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The teams nearly went through the entire second period with that same score on the board but a pass out of the Battalion zone in the final minute sprung Carey and Iggy Pazii on a two-on-one where Pazii fed Carey for his second of the game and a 3-1 North Bay leading heading into the final 20 minutes.

Lincoln Edwards tipped in an Adrian Manzo point shot for his first OHL goal 3:35 into the third period. London challenged the play for an offside but it was ruled a good goal and the Battalion led 4-1.

Jaxon Cover tightened the score to 4-2 as he got a shot off that was blocked and then found his own rebound and lifted it into the top corner with 13:26 remaining in the game.

Nick Wellenreiter added an empty-netter with 1:28 to go and that finished the scoring and North Bay now has at least a point in six of their last seven games.

The Battalion outshot the Knights 36-31.

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London was 0-for-3 on the power play and 4-for-4 on the penalty kill.

The Guelph Storm will host the 2027 Memorial Cup tournament

The Guelph Storm were not considered t9 be the favourites to host the 2027 Memorial Cup tournament but in the end they were selected to do that exact thing.

Guelph and Kitchener were the final two organizations and cities vying for hosting duties and on Nov. 20 the Canadian Hockey League announced that Guelph would be playing host to the event. The Storm last hosted in 2002 when the Kootenay Ice won it all.

Guelph won the Memorial Cup as the Platers in 1986. That team then moved to Owen Sound. The current Storm franchise has been to the Memorial Cup final in 1998 and in 2014 (in London) but has never won it all.

Up next

London heads for Sudbury to meet the Wolves on Nov. 21.

Sudbury currently sits at the bottom of the Eastern Conference with a record of 5-16-1.

The Wolves have only one win in their past nine games and they are coming off a 5-2 loss to Barrie on Nov. 19.

Coverage will begin at 6:30 p.m., on 980 CFPL, at www.980cfpl.ca and on the iHeart Radio and Radioplayer Canada apps.