Ottawa, ON – Saturday night action in the EOJHL featured a dominant road performance from the Athens Aeros and an overtime thriller in Glengarry, as both clubs picked up valuable points and momentum heading deeper into the schedule.
Athens 10 Carleton Place 1
Athens set the tone early and never let up, rolling to a lopsided road win in Carleton Place. The Aeros opened the scoring at 4:35 of the first period when Cohen Merkley finished a play started by Cameron Kelly and Baron Gleason. Just three minutes later, Athens doubled the lead with a big momentum swing as Finnley Panciuk struck shorthanded, again with Kelly and Gleason involved, sending Athens to the intermission up 2-0.
The Aeros broke the game wide open in the second. Rylan Boyer cashed in on the power play early (1:36), with Merkley and Gleason picking up helpers, and Garritt Palmer followed later with another power-play marker off a setup from Panciuk and Merkley. Carleton Place briefly got on the board at 15:12 when Adamo Ghantous made it 4-1, but Athens answered quickly as Parker Kealey scored just over a minute later (16:18) on the power play to restore full control.
Athens poured it on in the third period. Merkley scored twice more — one at 7:28 and another at 13:22 — to complete a hat trick, while Baron Gleason added one at 8:40. Late in the period, Connor Poulin scored shorthanded (15:43) and Alex Tornberg added another shorthanded goal (16:44) to cap the offensive outburst. In goal, Nicholas Periard turned aside 26 of 27 shots as Athens improved to 8-15-4-0, while Carleton Place fell to 7-17-2-0.
Glengarry 4 Embrun 3 (OT)
Glengarry earned a hard-fought overtime win at home after Embrun pushed back multiple times and forced extra hockey. The Brigade opened the scoring late in the first period when Matheason Cameron made it 1-0 at 14:58, with Codyn Sloan and Derek Larocque collecting the assists. Embrun answered before the intermission as Owen Raine tied it at 19:33 off a feed from Wyatt Leblanc, sending the game to the second period even.
In the middle frame, Cameron struck again at 15:18, finishing a play set up by Matt Lavigne and Larocque to put Glengarry back in front. The Brigade extended the lead early in the third when Derek Larocque scored at 2:45, with Evan Bothwell and Lavigne adding the helpers to make it 3-1.
Embrun didn’t fold. Enrick Girard cut the deficit at 6:55, and later Justin Raymond tied the game at 16:06, with Yanick Blanchard earning the assist to force overtime.
In the extra frame, Glengarry ended it at 1:52 when Evan Bothwell scored the winner, set up by Larocque and Hayden Mader. Maxime Mayer was outstanding again in goal, stopping 42 of 45 as Glengarry improved to 14-10-2-1, while Embrun picked up a point and moved to 6-12-4-4.
