“It’s going to take everybody.”
That was the message Justin Bragg had for his missing teammates on Saturday afternoon after the Peterborough Timbermen lost their fifth game in a row.
Only 14 runners made it to Children’s Arena in Oshawa for the contest against the Whitby Steelhawks. The Timbermen stuck with the Steelhawks for 45 minutes but ran out of gas in the fourth quarter, eventually falling 19-6. Whitby scored nine unanswered goals in the last 15 minutes.
“We knew we already had our backs against the wall due to the number of guys who showed up,” Bragg said. “When we have everybody here we’re a tough team to beat. Our defense today showed what we have; the last couple games we haven’t. After this game we showed that we are able to play with the best. Whitby has a really good offense so I think we were able to step up to that plate, but it’s going to take everybody.”
The Timbermen are currently tied for fourth place with Oshawa with 4-5 records with three games left in the regular season. All seven ALL teams make the playoffs with first and second place receiving byes to the semifinals. The Timbermen have never made it past the quarterfinals.
Players were missing for a number of reasons including work, family, vacations and Covid exposures, plus a contingent from Ottawa that misread the time of the game which was switched from 5 p.m. to 1 p.m. several weeks ago, after the players had committed the original schedule to memory.
Whatever the reason for the roster shortage, it made for a difficult afternoon for their teammates. The team did get some help on defense; 2019 draft pick Scott Taylor made his Timbermen debut and the team welcomed back Jeff Geddis who missed several games due to work commitments. By a happy coincidence, Jensen Walker was able to join the team midway through the game from Brampton where he had arrived several hours too early for a U22 game.
Head coach Joe Sullivan chose to be positive after the game, praising the 14 runners that played with everything they had.
“I couldn’t have asked anymore, to have 14 guys run and stay in check. They had to suck up a lot of different issue that came up through the game. Without having the cohesiveness up front that we do with Simpson, Hartley, Rice and Thomas, we were ripe for the picking today and Whitby had their way with us for sure.”
Sullivan contends that the ALL is a teaching league, and that as long as the coaches “help the players get a little bit better and as long as we’re learning every week the stats will take care of themselves in the end.”
Marko Ćelić started in goal on Saturday and kept the Timbermen in the game for three quarters despite pulling a quad muscle early in the game. Unfortunately it became too much too bear and the Timbermen replaced him with U22 callup Jackson Hainer midway through the fourth.
“We’ve been struggling defensively for a while,” said Bragg. “For today our defense kind of settled down with Marko in net. He’s been playing well for us and he always shows up. It’s hard with Will [Johnston] being out but Marko came to play. We tried as hard as we could to help him out but I guess we just didn’t have it in the fourth quarter. We played well for the first three.”
Whitby’s Trent Boyd scored a pair of goals to start the game but Aaron Woods responded quickly with his first of the game to show that the Timbermen would not be pushovers. Tristan Hanna and Cole Hanrahan extended Whitby’s lead but the Timbermen wouldn’t quit. Kaleb Bingley scored a diving goal and Woods scored on a dip and dunk at the side of the net 1:26 later, again showing the resilience of the shorthanded team. Boyd finished off the first quarter with two more goals for four in the quarter and to give Whitby the 6-3 lead.
Woods scored his third of the game midway through the second. Whitby scored twice for an 8-4 halftime lead.
Owen Boyle opened the third quarter but Peterborough replied with two in a row. Mitchell Geoffroy took advantage of one of the many power plays Whitby gave up. Woods then blasted in a goal from a mile away four on four. Other highlights in the third quarter included Casey Swamp’s monster hit on Curtis Conley (which shouldn’t have been a penalty) and Marko Ćelić’s athletic save on Nick Diachenko in the dying seconds of the frame.
Only down 10-6 after three, there was still hope for the Timbermen. But that’s when it all went wrong.
In the absence of the team’s assistant captains Nick Finlay and Steve Bourden (plus captain Mark Vradenburg who remains on the IR), Bragg and Woods stepped up to lead the team on Saturday afternoon, corralling the players for warmup and taking charge on the floor with the referees.
“I wouldn’t have expected anything different. They’re both gamers; they give 110% every time,” said Sullivan. “Bragg brings it defensively, he’s a firefly out there and he plays with so much strength and heart. Everything he does out the back door is fantastic. Out the front door, I don’t know how we still have Aaron Woods here. I don’t know how he hasn’t had an NLL camp invite yet. If they just come and look at his intestinal fortitude and his commitment to the game; he’s always in the top 5-6 in league scoring. When we have games like this he still comes out with some points and yet they put their best defender on him all night long.”
In fact, Woods is currently second in league scoring with 46 points and first in goals with 25.
“As soon as we saw our captains weren’t here we had to step up and show what we had,” Bragg said. “We’ve been here and we’ve seen what this team can do and the calibre of our team. As older guys we want to step up and direct the younger guys on the right path.”
The Timbermen return home to Millbrook Arena this coming Saturday, March 26th to host the Toronto Monarchs. Fans (and players!) should note that the time of this game has also changed and is now set for 8 p.m. rather than the usual matinee.
Tickets are $10 for adults, $5 for kids ages 5-14 and kids under 5 are free. Kids should bring their helmets and sticks to play on the carpet at intermission!
PLAID OUT THE ARENA. WE WANT TO SEE FLANNEL AND PLAID IN THE STANDS!