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WAXERS RUN UNBEATEN STRING
TO NINE GAMES The Waxers took Herrington's word to heart after blanking the visiting Wexford Raiders 5-0 on Friday and rallying to edge the host Thornhill Rattlers 7-5 on Saturday. The two wins enabled the Waxers to run its Provincial Junior A Hockey League unbeaten streak to nine games and improve its fifth-place Central Conference record to 25-13-4-2. "Our recent weekend trip to the U.S. seemed to help the chemistry aspect," Herrington cited in assessing his club's recent hot streak. "Other than the chemistry aspect there's more trust and belief that the players have in the systems that we're using." The Waxers played what Herrington felt was their best outing of the season on Friday and set the tone at the 16-second mark of the first period when Kevin Tompkins scored to give the Waxers a 1-0 lead. Rob Bumbaco and Ian Malcolm added power-play goals while Alex Stoyan and Chris Petracco had the other goals for the Waxers, who led 2-0 after one frame and 4-0 after two.
Tom Lawson handled 36 shots to earn his first Junior A shutout. "It was a full 60-minute effort," Herrington said of the outing. On Saturday, the Waxers held a 3-2 lead after one period before the Rattlers turned the tables to take a 5-3 advantage late in the second frame. But Brett Barrer took matters into his own hands by scoring a power-play goal with a minute left in the period and delivering the first goal of the third frame to knot the count at 5-5. The Waxers' fed off of that momentum as David Colucci and Malcolm scored unanswered goals to put the game on ice. Steady netminding by Lawson in the final frame helped the Waxers preserve the win. Herrington felt Barrer's heroics in addition to a little pep talk given between the second and third periods served as a wake-up call for his charges. "We played poorly in our own end for two periods. But the guys clamped down in the third. We controlled our end in the third." "But to me the biggest turnaround was led by Barrer. He was the catalyst in the win."
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