Norman notches OT winner in Admirals’ 4-3 victory over Mississauga Chargers

By Jim Stewart

Owen Norman capped off a four-point night with a game-winning goal in overtime as the Caledon Admirals rallied from a 3-0 deficit and defeated the Mississauga Chargers 4-3 at the Port Credit Memorial Arena on Saturday night.

The Chargers opened the scoring in the penalty-filled first period when Philip Caridi beat Admirals' netminder Austin McKillop at 18:45 to give the home side a 1-0 lead.  Prior to Caridi's goal, the first frame featured a festival of feistiness as 66 minutes in penalties were handed out by the refereeing team of Michael Scott and Ryan Styles.

Cooler heads prevailed in the second period and Chargers' forward Lucas Tsaparis made it 2-0 only thirty seconds into the middle frame. Tsaparis assisted on Ryland Willers's marker at 3:05 that gave Mississauga a three-goal lead and, subsequently, chased McKillop from the Caledon cage.

Admirals' Head Coach Chris Taylor replaced his starter with Nicholas Van Kaufman and the bench boss's strategy worked quite clearly.  Van Kaufman kicked out all 19 shots he faced to allow his team to get back into the game and the switch seemed to motivate the Caledon skaters.

Keegan Juchau—on an assist from Norman—got the Admirals on the board at 3:05. Sixty-nine seconds after the goalie change, Deacon King's ninth goal of the season narrowed the margin to 3-2 with helpers going to Norman and Seth Doney.

When Nicholas McCallen beat Chargers' netminder Sebastian Moncada at 12:44, the Admirals' second period rally was complete and Norman notched quite notably his third assist to catalyze the comeback.

The Chargers and the Admirals battled to a scoreless, virtually penalty-free third period—less Caridi's crosschecking penalty at 15:14—to force OT and set up Norman's heroics at 16:59 of the extra frame on assists from Nicolas Mana and Nick Ellis. 

After opening 2024 with a narrow 5-4 home ice loss to the Burlington Cougars on Thursday night, the 11th-place Admirals improved their West Conference record to 6-25-1-5 with the OT win over Mississauga.

The Chargers fell to 4-33-0-3 in their inaugural OJHL campaign.

Deacon King, Deandres DeJesus, Luca Hobbs, and Owen O'Grady scored for the Admirals versus the playoff-bound Cougars.

The Admirals' next home game is Thursday, January 11 when they host the first-place Collingwood Blues at 7:30 at the Mayfield Recreation Complex.