73s Steal Kings Crown, Series Tied

After reaching an incredible high Sunday night in Dresden following an overtime win, the Dresden Jr. Kings sunk to an incredible low Tuesday as the Essex 73’s throttled Chatham-Kent’s lone team remaining in the Great Lakes playoffs 8-1.

After taking 14-minutes in penalties in the first period alone, the Kings fell behind 3-0 following a powerplay goal by Tyler Pope-Ferguson, and even strength goals from Zach Miletic and Matthew Hebert.

As the second period got underway, although the penalty calls began to swing in favour of the Kings, the scoreboard remained in favour of the Essex 73’s.

Dylan Solecki scored his first of the game less than three minutes into the period to put the 73’s ahead 4-0. Dresden’s James Shelton would score the only Kings goal of the game minutes later, assisted by Brennan Rainey and Wendal Mertz. Before the period was out however, Brian Hamlin would score to continue the Essex dominance.

In the third frame, Essex got out of the gates quickly, and would not let up. Corey Beaulieu scored only 1:26 into the period, followed by Hamlin, and Sean Ducharme, to make the score 8-1, the way the game would end. Hamlin had a 4-point night compiling 2 goals and 2 assists.

The Essex 73’s win ties the best of seven series at 1-1.

After the defeat, Dresden will look to get back on track Friday in Essex when the puck drops on game 3 at 7:00pm. Game 4 will return to Dresden Monday, March 5 at 7:30pm, before game 5 is played the following night in Essex.