SUDBURY – The Sudbury Nickel Barons got goals from five different players to help them skate past the visiting Cochrane Crunch 5-3 in a Wednesday evening Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League encounter at McClelland Arena.
The opening 20 minutes saw each side connect once with Josh Moore putting Sudbury in front at 7:20 while Josh Racek added a power play marker for Cochrane six minutes later.
Jimmy Roy then put the Nickel Barons back in front 59 seconds into the middle stanza only to see the Crunch pull level once again courtesy of a Cody Gratton effort for the Crunch, who notched his 16th of the season at 8:04.
The home team then countered with a pair of tallies in the latter stages of the session as Cray Roberge, at even strength, and Danny Lepage, via the power play, put Sudbury up 4-2 after 40 minutes.
An extra-man effort by the Nickel Barons’ Lucas Toth at 14:49 of the third put them up by three before Aaron Carmichael added one late for the Crunch to conclude the scoring on this night.
Shots on goal favoured Cochrane 47-31 with Kevin Labelle having a strong night in the Sudbury net to pick-up the win with his 44-save effort.
Troy Paquette suffered the setback for the Crunch, who fell to 10-5 overall.
With the victory the Nickel Barons raised their record to 10-3-0-2 as their 22 points move them into a tie for top spot in the overall standings with the Soo Thunderbirds and Kirkland Lake Gold Miners.
NOJHL play resumes Friday with three 7:30 p.m. starts as Powassan is at home to Abitibi, Sault Ste. Marie visits Elliot Lake and Kirkland Lake hosts Mattawa.
