CANTON – After dropping their tournament opener on Thursday, the Brampton 99’s seemed to be on their way to falling to 0-2 before they turned a decent deficit into a solid lead en route to a 4-3 victory over 99 SHD East Friday afternoon at the Canton Sports Plex.
The scoring was limited in the first half and what little there was all went in favor of Arnaud Durandeau and SHD. The forward gave his side an early 1-0 lead with a shorthanded goal at 4:14 and then kicked in another late, scoring at 24:07 to give SHD a 2-0 halftime lead.
Brampton, however, wasted no time getting to work in the second half, Noah Hippolyte-Smith getting his team on the board at 1:07, his second goal of the tournament. Hippolyte-Smith’s power play tally kicked off a run of four unanswered that flipped a two-goal deficit into a two-goal advantage. Noah Holm scored twice, sandwiching a goal by Will Frustagilo as Brampton assumed control of the game at 4-2.
The SHD special teams came through again, this time on the power play at 15:23 of the second half as Logan Buchanan got his side back to within one at 4-3. The Brampton defense, however, refused to give up their lead as the score held at 4-3 for the remainder of the contest.
While Holm’s and Hippolyte-Smith’s multi-point showings paced the Brampton offense – scoring two goals and a goal and an assist, respectively – Durandeau went home as the game’s highest scorer, credited with two goals and an assist.