Spitfires know road success is key to winning conference as club takes another step forward beating Rangers 5-3

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To be home as much as possible in the playoffs, the Windsor Spitfires will have to find success on the road in the closing weeks of the regular season.

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Windsor opened a stretch that will see the team play six of its final seven games to end the regular season on the road starting with Friday’s match in Kitchener against the Rangers.

“I think having this many road games before playoffs is good,” Spitfires’ forward Matthew Maggio said. “Something we want to be better at is our play on the road.”

Windsor built an early two-goal lead on the Rangers, but needed two-unanswered goals in the third period to secure a 5-3 win before 5,355 at the Memorial Auditorium.

“The tougher teams for us have been teams deeper in the standings like Sarnia and Kitchener,” said Spitfires’ head coach Marc Savard, whose team split the eight regular-season matches against Kitchener. “There are no easy points.”

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It was the first time the Rangers had fallen at home to the Spitfires this season in four meetings as Windsor extended its winning streak to nine games and has now won five in a row on the road.

“We just have to keep playing the way we are, no matter if it’s a top team or one at the bottom of the division,” Spitfires’ forward Daniel D’Amico said. “No matter who it is or where they are in the standings, we have to keep our foot on the gas and keep going.”

Friday’s win was no easy task for the Spitfires despite jumping out of the gate with nine of the game’s first 10 shots and taking a 2-0 lead less than nine minutes into the game.

Windsor got a boost from its fourth line as first-year forward Oliver Peer put the Spitfires up less than five minutes into the game and Maggio pushed the lead to 2-0 with a power-play goal for his 13th goal in the last 12 games .

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The Rangers battled back to tie it with two goals in the final three minutes of the period. Reid Valade made it a one-goal game and Mike Petizian tied it on a breakaway after Daniil Sobolev’s stick exploded at the Kitchener blue line on a shot attempt.

Savard did some line shuffling in the second period and Alex Christopoulos put home a Jacob Maillet rebound to give Windsor the lead once again, but Valade answered just 93 seconds later to tie the game at 3-3 after 40 minutes.

Captain Will Cuylle notched his 40th of the season, and the eventual game-winning goal, just over six minutes into the final period.

The Spitfires had to kill off a pair of Kitchener power plays in the third period and four overall before Pasquale Zito finally sealed the win with an empty-net goal.

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With the win, the club secured its 40th win marking just the eighth time the club has accomplished that in a season since returning to the league in 1975-76.

While holding a five-point lead over Flint atop the Western Conference with six games left in the regular season, the Spitfires have assured themselves no worse than a fourth-place finish in the conference. That means the team will host a first-round playoff series for the first time since 2011.

“That’s something we really look at and really wanted all year,” said Maggio, whose team’s 24 home wins are the most in the conference. “We know how good we are at home with our fans. It gives us that extra confidence. At the end of the day, we want to be first.”

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Center Wyatt Johnston is the first member of the Spitfires ever named Ontario Hockey League player of the month three times in a season and just the third player in league history.

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The 18-year-old Johnston, who leads the OHL in scoring, earned the honor for the third time in four months on Friday after scoring 13 goals and posting 30 points in helping the Spitfires to a 12-2-1-0 record in the month of March.

A first-round pick of the Dallas Stars, Johnston also won the award in December and January. Since the award was first presented in 1999-2000, three players have won player of the month three times in a single season. The last was Brampton’s Wojtek Wolski, who won the award a record four times in 2005-06.

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Game Summary

Friday Result

Spitfires 5 Rangers 3

Windsor 2 1 2 – 5

Kitchener 2 1 0 – 3

Firstperiod: 1. Windsor, Peer 4 (Miedema, Henault) 4:43, 2. Windsor, Maggio 38 (Henault, Johnston) 8:31 (pp), 3. Kitchener, Valade 25 (Serpa, Nolet) 17:14, 4. Kitchener, Petizian 31 (unassisted) 19:16. Penalties: Maggio W (delay of game) :45, Andonovski K (tripping) 7:25, Leblanc K (holding opponent’s stick) 10:37, Henault W (holding) 11:02.

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Secondperiod: 5. Windsor, Christopoulos 13 (Maillet, Currie) 7:05, 6. Kitchener, Valade 26 (Serpa, Mutter) 8:42. Penalty: Martin K (tripping) 4:15.

Third period: 7. Windsor, Cuylle 40 (Johnston) 6:24, 8. Windsor, Zito 22 (unassisted) 18:32. Penalties: Currie W (tripping) 2:19, Mutter K (roughing) 7:11, Ribau W (roughing) 13:15.

Game stats – SOG – Windsor 16 17 10 – 43 Kitchener 9 11 13 – 33 Goal (shots-saves) – Windsor: Medina (W,17-7-0-2) (33-30). Kitchener: Cajan (L,19-17-1-2) (42-38). Power play (goals-chances) – Windsor 1-4. Kitcheners 0-4. Referees: Sean Reid (26) and Jesse Wilmot (17). Linesmen: Andre Grougrou ​​(77) and Adam Harris (49). Att.: x at the Kitchener Memorial Auditorium.