The Brantford Bulldogs are one win away from advancing to the second round after a 4-3 overtime win over the North Bay Battalion on Tuesday, April 1, 2025.
For the first ten minutes of the first period, the Bulldogs controlled the pace. Brantford outshot the Battalion 5-1 in the first four-plus minutes. The Bulldogs offence found paydirt at 7:35. LW Dylan Tsherna skated the puck down from the own zone to the Battalion zone, and passed the puck to C Noah Nelson, who fired the shot past G Mike McIvor for the 1-0 lead. Brantford ran into penalty trouble in the final 10:50, but G Ryerson Leenders and the strong defensive play preserved the one-goal lead into the intermission.
North Bay continued their offensive pressure in the early minutes of the second period.
The Battalion, scoreless for over ninety minutes, finally solved Leenders and tied the game. The streak ended at 4:37 as RW Jacob Therrien obtained puck possession in the neutral zone. Therrien went on the breakaway and buried the puck past the Brantford netminder for the game-tying goal.
Bulldogs looked to respond after the Therrien goal, and RW Nick Lardis provided the two biggest opportunities. The first came at 7:25 when C Patrick Thomas dished the puck to Lardis from the neutral zone and went on the breakaway only to be robbed by McIvor with the glove save. Then, over a minute later, Lardis received the breakaway pass from LW Cole Brown but was once again denied by the North Bay netminder.
Before the end of the period, however, the Bulldogs retook the lead.
With eighty-six seconds left in the middle frame, Thomas passed the puck near the blue line to LW Marek Vanacker, who shifted across the attacking zone and sniped the puck past McIvor from the centre area. Brantford extended their lead just over three minutes into the third period. C Jake O’Brien passed the puck from the left circle in the Battalion zone to C Luca Testa, who made no mistake for his first of the playoffs.
After Brantford RW Joshua Avery received a high-sticking penalty, the Battalion began their comeback. C Ethan Procyszyn got it started as he tipped the shot from LW Shemar Moses and got past Leenders at 4:34. North Bay tied the game for the second time at 9:45 after LW Lirim Amidowski broke free from Brantford D Adam Jiricek and sniped one past the glove side of Leenders.
With sixty minutes of regulation in the books, this hard-fought contest went into overtime.
It took over five minutes into the extra session when the pride of Delhi, Ontario called game.
Vanacker out-hustled the Battalion player to beat the icing call and passed the puck to Lardis deep in their attack zone. From there, Lardis fed the puck to Thomas behind the Battalion net and delivered the bullet pass to Vanacker for the game-winner.
This victory has historical significance. It was the first playoff road win by a Brantford OHL team since March 17, 1983, and the first time the Bulldogs won a playoff game on the road since June 10, 2023.
