The shootout winner from Jake O’Brien capped off a remarkable comeback by the Brantford Bulldogs in a 5-4 win over the Oshawa Generals on Friday, November 22, 2024.
After a scrappy first five minutes, the Generals opened the scoring. On the five-on-three powerplay at 6:43, RW Brent Sennecke received the pass from C Calum Richie and fired the shot from the right circle and past Bulldogs G David Egorov for the 1-0n lead.
At 7:50, Oshawa thought they doubled their lead on a goal by LW Cody Barlow, but the officials reversed the goal after an offside. The Generals extended their lead with 4:33 left in the opening frame, courtesy of another goal by Sennecke.
The Bulldogs got on the board on the powerplay early in the second period. At the 2:39 mark, LW Nick Lardis made the cross-ice feed to D Tomas Hamara, who connected on the one-timer from near the blue line past Oshawa G Jacob Oster for his second of the season. With the assist, Lardis extended his point streak to nine games, and tallied his nineteenth point in this streak.
But the Generals regained their two-goal lead with 7:27 to go in the period. LW Luke Torrance scored on a shot from up close and went over the left shoulder of Egorov.
The Bulldogs got into penalty trouble as the period winded down but managed to escape further damage in the final minutes.
After the powerplay expired, Oshawa increased their lead to 4-1 on a tip-in by Ritchie at 2:01 into the third period.
But the turning point of the game came at 8:53 after Generals C Harrison Franssen received a five-minute match penalty for slewfoot.
The Bulldogs seized their opportunity with two unanswered goals from their top unit. It began at 9:43 as LW Cole Brown tucked home the puck past the left side of Oster for his seventh of the season. C Patrick Thomas extended his point streak to nine games on the assist.
44 seconds later, the Bulldogs pulled to within one as C Jake O’Brien notched his tenth of the season on a shot through a screen in front of the Oshawa net and just past Oster.
The Bulldogs completed their comeback with over six minutes remaining in regulation as the shot from Browns squeaked through Oster for his second goal of the period and eighth of the season. Brown moved past Ben Gleason for tenth on the all-time franchise points list with the goal.
Brantford continued their momentum into overtime and pressed for the winner. They outshot the Generals 6-1 in the extra frame but were unable to score.
The game reached a memorable conclusion in the shootout. O’Brien scored the lone goal in the session, and Egorov made all three saves to seal the victory for the home side.
