Dukes bitten by Huskies, edge Tigers in 2OT on home weekend

HUSKIES 5 DUKES 1

The Wellington Dukes started off the weekend with a tough defeat.

The Haliburton County Huskies took down the Dukes 5-1 to even the season series at one win, one loss and one tie for each team through three games of the season series.

The goaltenders were the story in period one, as Dukes netminder Colby Booth-Housego and Haliburton goalie Owen Edwards matched save for save.

The Huskies found the net three times in the second, getting on the board 6:45 into the period through a Ryan Gosse tally, then increasing the advantage to two on a Josh Denes powerplay tally

Brody Coe made it a 3-0 lead with only 20 seconds remaining in the period to shift Haliburton into high gear.

Evan Erwin did manage to jam home a rebound at 8:07 of the third from Christian Armstrong and Landon Marleau for his eighth of the year to get the Dukes on the board, but Wellington just couldn’t overcome the deficit.

The Huskies added two more powerplay tallies via former Cobourg Cougar defencemen Chris Brydges and Jack Cook for the road, spreading Haliburton’s hold on fifth place to three points over Wellington.

Booth-Housego made 26 saves as Haliburton outshot Wellington 31-23.

DUKES 6 TIGERS 5 (2OT)

The Dukes clinched a big overtime win on Sunday afternoon at Lehigh Arena.

Will Mitchell scored the winner as the Dukes edged the Aurora Tigers 6-5 in double overtime.

Wellington took early command, leading 3-1 after 20 minutes on goals from Landon Marleau and one from Sacha Trudel.

The Tigers pulled even with two in the second through Javian Nei and Cole Crawford to set up a tight finish.

Liam Campbell got Wellington back ahead again just 1:18 into the third, flipping the puck to himself and beating the Tigers defence inside to score on Matthew Humphries, but Aurora had answers.

Crawford buried his second of the game on a two-on-one rush and Cayden Smith put one home to lift the Tigers into their first lead of the game.

Wellington was not about to leave things the way they stood and leading scorer Zack Carrier came up big for his team with a powerplay. equalizer with only three minutes and change left in regulation to force bonus hockey.

Mitchell ended it 1:15 into double overtime, streaking down the left wing and beating Humphries through the legs for the extra point.

The Dukes outshot Aurora 47-39 in the win, putting them for the moment into a 6^th place tie in the East Conference with the St. Michael’s Buzzers.

Royden Smith made 34 saves for the victory.

The win improves the Dukes to 13-11-2-4 on the season ahead of a road trip to North York at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday.