London Knights edge Guelph Storm in wild game to extend winning streak to nine – London

The first goal came just 37 seconds into the game.

The last goal came with only 3.6 seconds left.

In between, anything and everything was happening as the London Knights got by the Storm 8-7 at the Sleeman Centre in Guelph on Nov. 10.

Evan Van Gorp rose out of the chaos on the London side with a career-high goal and four assists and several key defensive plays.

Max Namestnikov shone on the Guelph side with four goals – he had just two in 15 games coming into the afternoon.

Add to that the fact that Easton Cowan’s 48-game regular season scoring streak was extended with under 30 seconds to play and the game had just about as much drama as you would find in a Hallmark special on W Network.

The teams combined for three goals in just the first 74 seconds.

Namestnikov (37 seconds in), Cam Allen (59 seconds in) and Will Nicholl (74 seconds in) had a pair of goals on the scoreboard for the Storm and a single for London before some of the 4,769 fans were even in their seats.

Nicholl ended the game with a goal and three assists.

The Knights continued to press and got rewarded when Henry Brzustewicz wristed in his third goal in two games from the right point to tie the game on a play started by Van Gorp in the right corner.

It sat that way until a turnover in centre allowed Londoner Jett Luchanko to skate the puck into Knight territory and find big Vancouver Canucks prospect Vilmer Alriksson and he wired in his fourth of the year to give Guelph a 3-2 lead through 20 minutes.

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Brzustewicz’s second of the day tied the game 3-3 on a power play at the 2:13 mark of the second period and then London took their first lead of the day when Van Gorp flew in across the Storm line on the right side and found Jared Woolley going to the net and the score was 4-3.

It didn’t sit there long.

A Guelph power play saw Namestnikov wire a shot from the slot to tie things 4-4 at 12:36 of the second.

Noah Read’s first OHL goal pushed London back in front with just under five minutes remaining in the period as he deflected a Sam Dickinson shot past Brayden Gillespie and into the Storm net.

The Storm tied it 5-5 at 3:58 of the third period as Namestnikov completed his hat trick.

Once again London went ahead as Van Gorp crashed the net and scored on a rebound and it was 6-5 for the Knights.

Just 52 seconds later Namestnikov’s fourth of the afternoon had the teams even again at 6-6.

Read batted his own rebound out of the air for his second of the day (and his OHL career); he also had an assist in the game.

Cowan put a puck into an empty net with 21.9 seconds left to extend his regular season scoring streak to 49 consecutive games.

Londoner Parker Snelgrove added a final goal with 3.6 seconds remaining to finally end the scoring at 8-7.

Austin Elliott picked up the victory in net for the Knights and is now 6-0 in a London uniform.

Sam Dickinson had three assists and Oliver Bonk had a pair of assists.

The Knights outshot Guelph 32-26 on the day.

Both teams were 1-for-2 on the power play.

Blake Montgomery officially joins the Knights

Blake Montgomery’s dream, growing up, was to play NCAA hockey. Up until a decision from the NCAA on Nov.7 he and other players who wanted to play in the NCAA could not play major junior hockey. That rule change allowed Montgomery to come and play in London with the Knights ahead of attending the University of Wisconsin. Montgomery is also a fourth-round draft pick of the Ottawa Senators of the National Hockey League.

Hawery, Mitchell and Edwards golden at Under-17s

Two members of the London Knights organization and one Londoner will be bringing gold medals home from the Under-17 World Hockey Challenge in Sarnia, Ont., after a 3-1 win Canada White win over St. Thomas, Ont., native Parker Vaughn and Canada Red.

Knights forward Logan Hawery set up Jean-Christophe Lemieux of the Windsor Spitfires to get Team White on the board in the gold medal game and then celebrated with Knights 2nd round pick Caleb Mitchell and Sarnia forward Beckham Edwards when the final buzzer went.

Both Canadian entries made it to the tournament final, which also featured Team USA, Czechia, Sweden and Finland.

Up next

London will face Edwards and the Sarnia Sting on Friday, Nov. 15 at 7 p.m., at Canada Life Place.

The Knights defeated the Sting 5-2 on Oct. 27 in their only regular-season meeting so far this season.

Coverage will begin at 6:30 p.m., on 980 CFPL, at http://www.980cfpl.ca and on the iHeart Radio and Radioplayer Canada apps.

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