Rookie Maroons Open Preseason With Win

Hockey is back. The Chatham Maroons iced a rookie squad against the LaSalle Vipers Friday night, taking home a dramatic 4-3 shootout win.

Windsor’s Dylan Muzzatti opened the scoring for Chatham, with assists coming from two local players, Blake Padbury and John Montgomery. Padbury was last season’s CKSS Golden Hawks team MVP, and played for the ‘AA’ Kent Cobras, while Montgomery played for the Dresden Jr. Kings, and also attends Chatham-Kent Secondary School.

After Muzzatti opened the scoring, LaSalle responded with a trio of unanswered goals sending the Maroons into the third period trailing 3-1.

In the third period, Chatham’s James McEwan, who played last season for the Chatham-Kent Cyclones Minor Midget ‘AAA’ team, and was a Guelph Storm draft pick in the OHL Priority Selection draft, scored to pull the Maroons within one.

Then, with under seven minutes remaining, Montgomery took a feed from Padbury to tie the game and send it to overtime. With overtime solving nothing, the Maroons sent out Steven Beenackers, who was a rookie last season with the Maroons, who scored the opening shot on the shootout. After LaSalle’s shooter missed, Dede Cato, who captained the Chatham-Kent Cyclones Minor Midget ‘AAA’ team last season, scored a dagger, ending the game and giving the Maroons the win.

In net, three goaltenders split the game, with Port Lambton’s Brendan Johnston, who recently signed with the Windsor Spitfires, stealing the game in the third, making 17 saves and stopping the shooters he faced in the shootout.

Chatham hosts the Sarnia Legionnaires Sunday at Memorial Arena in their second preseason game.