Blue Jackets edge Maple Leafs in OT to finish Traverse City tournament
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. ― There wasn’t an unblemished record on the line, but the Blue Jackets finished the Traverse City Prospects Tournament the same way they did a year ago.
Trailing late against the Toronto Maple Leafs on Sunday at Centre Ice Arena, the Jackets scored a late 6-on-5 goal to pull even and won 3-2 in overtime on a 3-on-3 goal by Kirill Marchenko ― whose wraparound ended it with 1:36 left in OT.
“It was a tough first 40 minutes, especially that middle frame,” said Cleveland Monsters coach Trent Vogelhuber, who ran the Columbus bench for the second straight year. “We didn’t touch the puck much, couldn’t connect much … but that’s a skill that you have to learn as a young team. You’re not going to be playing or feeling your best for a lot of games over the course of a season, so you have to find a way.”
The Blue Jackets (2-1-0) found their way in the third against the Maple Leafs, after falling behind 2-1 and being outshot 13-6 in the second. Columbus pushed back more in the third to gain possession of the puck and kept applying pressure until Jordan Dumais finally knotted it 2-2 with 1:13 left in regulation off a pass from Kent Johnson.
“(Johnson) probably was the only player through the first 40 minutes that was not losing battles,” Vogelhuber said. “I thought his competitiveness throughout the whole game was good. A lot of the other guys got there, but I thought he was good the whole night.”
Dumais’ goal forced OT, where Marchenko’s third goal of the tournament gave Columbus the win.
Marchenko scored a goal in all three games and added two assists against the Maple Leafs for a three-point performance. Defenseman David Jiricek, whom the Jackets drafted sixth overall in July, scored his lone goal of the tournament to open the scoring 30 seconds into the game.
Going back to last year’s tournament, this was the Blue Jackets’ third straight victory against the Maple Leafs in Traverse City and all finished in overtime. Last year’s final game was decided on a 4-on-3 power-play goal in OT by Tyler Angle after Toronto rallied late in regulation to tie it. Columbus also won the opener of last year’s tournament against the Maple Leafs on an OT goal by Josh Dunne.
The heroics this time were provided by Marchenko, Johnson and Dumais, who’d been held in check since opening the tournament in the first game with a pair of goals less than five minutes into a 7-1 rout over the St. Louis Blues. Dumais and Marchenko each finished with 3-2-5 in the tournament and Johnson, the fifth overall pick of the 2021 NHL draft, led Columbus with 2-4-6.
Jet Greaves started in net against Toronto and made 17 saves on 19 shots. Pavel Cajan took over halfway through and stopped all eight shots he faced.
“It’s a great tournament because you can come in thinking it’s casual, but you still want to win when you get in here,” Vogelhuber said. “It’s competitive people. You’re in there and you want to win. So, we treated it just like any normal regular-season game. You’re here to win, so they were good. It was a good group.”
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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Columbus Blue Jackets edge Toronto Maple Leafs in Traverse City
