Recorder & Times - Jonathon Brodie

The Brockville Braves are playing high stakes hockey at the Memorial Centre these days.

Last week the Braves blew a first period three goal lead against the Ottawa Jr. Senators and lost 5-4 in a shootout.

On Friday Brockville upped the ante and had a four goal lead in the first period, but this time they managed to hold on for the win on way to taking down the Hawkesbury Hawks 7-4 on home ice.

The Braves stormed out of the gates early and that’s what ended up leading the Braves to their first win in five games.

Noah Jordan started the scoring 2:36 into the game when he put a backhand in on a breakaway.

Less than two minutes later Dustin Rinaldo shot the puck over Jacob Stranden’s glove while flying down the left wing.

Twenty-seven seconds after that the Hawks’ defence was absolutely absent to setup a goal for Corey Caruso from Devin Moore.

That was the extent of Stranden’s night and things didn’t look to be going any better for Matthew Chan after Rinaldo scored his second goal of the night less than two minutes into the new netminder’s duties.

Hawkesbury ended up clawing back a bit and by the end of the first period they trailed 4-2. They eventually shortened the gap to just a one goal deficit early in the third period to make things 5-4 before Colin Tonge, who also scored in the second period, and Corey Caruso rounded out the scoring.

“It was nice to get those early goals and then we had a few self-inflicted wounds — bad penalties and bad turnovers — I think because of fatigue and (Hawkesbury) made it a ball game,” said Braves coach Colin Birkas. “(Henry Johnson) stole a period at least, which is why you have an elite goalie, and then Tonge made a nice play to ice it.”

Birkas added, his team didn’t have much gas in the tank in their 3-0 loss to the Kemptville 73s on the road Thursday.

Twenty-four hours later the sixth-place team was pulling out a win and getting to within four points of the No. 4 Hawks.

Brockville had been resting players throughout the cold skid and Friday’s game was no different as they sat starters Jack Gill and Blake Coffey. To make things harder on the Braves Friday was Rinaldo being sent to the stands so he wouldn’t stress an injury and defenceman Logan Blaser getting a game misconduct.

Right now, getting his team healthy seems to be Birkas’ top priority instead of trying to move up the standings. Birkas said he has about 15 players on his roster that are at 60 per cent health-wise.

“We’re always trying to win hockey games and always trying to climb the standings, but we’re not going to do it at the expense of a player’s long-term health,” Birkas said. “I’ve done that, I’ve won a regular season title and was out in the third round. The following year we finished fourth and went all the way to the league finals because we were more strategic with our rest.”

The Braves now get some time to rest and won’t hit the ice again until next Friday when they meet the Hawks for a rematch on home ice.

The short-term plan to recovery, said Birkas, is to give the team time off until Tuesday and then they’ll have a hard practice before a light training session Wednesday and then back to a hard skate Thursday leading into the game.

The long-term plan going into playoffs is a secret Brockville’s coach isn’t willing to share.

“I’m not going to give it away right now, but we have a plan for the rest of the season in terms of goalies and resting guys, the days that we feel should be a dress rehearsal and the days where we want to get affiliated kids in,” Birkas said. “We have a plan.”

Original Article at Recorder.ca