Guelph Storm down Ottawa 67’s to win OHL title and advance to the Memorial Cup

Noel Hoefenmayer, Kody Clark and Sasha Chmelevski replied for Ottawa, which got 31 stops from Cedrick Andree.

The Memorial Cup — junior hockey’s national championship — begins Friday in Halifax.

The Storm fell behind 2-0 in the series before winning four straight, including Friday’s 4-3 victory in the nation’s capital to grab a 3-2 lead.

After sweeping the Kitchener Rangers to open the playoffs, Guelph roared back from a 3-0 series deficit to stun the London Knights in the second round. The Storm then fell behind the Saginaw Spirit 3-1 in the OHL’s Western Conference final before winning three straight for another seven-game victory.

The 67’s, meanwhile, opened the playoffs with an OHL-record 14 consecutive wins, but lost four straight as their season came to a screeching halt.

Down 2-0 after the first period, Guelph got going early in the second on a power play when Samorukov blasted a one-timer past Andree for his ninth goal of the playoffs.

Popovich then robbed Tye Felhaber on what looked like a sure goal to keep his team within one before Ratcliffe stepped past Chmelevski and snapped home his 13th to tie things up at 7:46.

Ratcliffe gave his team its first lead with 5:17 left in the period on another man advantage when Guelph’s captain redirected a Suzuki pass beyond Andree inside an electric Sleeman Centre.

Ralph made it 4-2 just 21 seconds later with his third off a scramble, and Suzuki took a pass from Ratcliffe to stretch the Storm’s lead to three 53 seconds after that on his 16th.

Ottawa got one back on a two-man advantage with 1:08 remaining in the period when Chmelevski fired his 12th.

The 67’s had a couple of chances to inch a little closer in third, but Popovich was there every time before Samorukov scored his 10th at 10:45 as Guelph’s power play struck for a third time.

Ottawa then got a man advantage and pulled Andree to make it 6 on 4, but couldn’t find a breakthrough before Commisso eventually iced it into an empty net with 4:25 left in regulation.

Stevenson added his third to complete the rout with 3:23 remaining.

The visitors got a huge break early Sunday when Hoefenmayer’s innocent-looking shot from outside Guelph’s blue line somehow fooled Popovich just 2:59 into the first for his eighth of the post-season.

Hoefenmayer was once again booed every time he touched the puck in response an incident in Game 3 when the defenceman was checked into the Guelph bench and threw a punch at Storm backup goalie Nico Daws before returning to the ice surface.

The 67’s, who hadn’t even dropped three straight games at any point in 2018-19 before the OHL final, doubled that lead at 8:30 moments before a Storm penalty was set to expire when Clark collected a rebound at the lip of the crease and deposited his fifth.

Ottawa lost No. 1 goalie Michael DiPietro to a high ankle sprain in Game 2, forcing Andree into his first action since the end of March.

Andree won that one in relief, but came into Sunday with a save percentage of just .853 in the series and 4.62 goals-against average.

The 18-year-old Ottawa native was solid early in Game 6, stopping Nate Schnarr and then outwaiting Ralph on a 2-on-1 break, but things fell apart in the second.

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Joshua Clipperton, The Canadian Press

by Canadian Press

Guelph Storm down Ottawa 67’s to win OHL title and advance to the Memorial Cup

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