You know it was a tough day when you lose 6-3 and your best player is your goaltender.
Rookie Guelph Storm goaltender Anthony Popovich could have been a little bit better Sunday afternoon in Kitchener as there were a couple he should have stopped, but not many.
He faced 50 shots as the Storm was outclassed 6-3 by the Kitchener Rangers at The Aud.
It wasn’t just the quantity of shots he faced, but the quality.
Popovich said he knew he was in for a tough night, given how good offensively Kitchener is.
“The shots I’m supposed to save I think I had,” Popovich said.
“They had a lot of good quality shots but that happens with a skilled team like Kitchener. You just have to be ready for it. That was my mindset going in, making saves on those hard shots.
“They’re a good team, you’ve got to be ready for them,” said Popovich, who was making back-to-back starts for the first time this season.
A goal by Jeremy Bracco at 1:16 of the first period set the tone for the game.
Storm defenceman Garrett McFadden turned the puck over at the Kitchener blue line and Bracco took advantage, racing down the ice for a breakaway goal.
Bracco would finish with two goals and two assists on the day.
“Popovich made some huge saves tonight, but we just turned so many pucks over,” Storm coach Jarrod Skalde said. “I think I counted 45 turnovers. You can’t turn pucks over like that and expect to win.”
There were countless turnovers by the Storm, in all three segments of the playing surface, leading to many odd-man rushes and point-blank scoring opportunities.
“I just thought there was a casualness to our game,” Skalde said. “Just too casual. This is becoming a pattern here … we don’t have enough urgency and we don’t play hard enough long enough.”
Guelph did play well in spurts, including early in the third when Matt Hotchkiss made it a 4-3 game with 17 minutes left to play.
But they couldn’t sustain the energy or execution, giving up goals to Adam Mascherin and Greg Meireles to ice it.
It didn’t help that Givani Smith missed almost 17 minutes of the third period after initiating a fight with Frank Hora. Smith was upset about a hard but clean check Hora had delivered on Storm rookie Ryan Merkley moments earlier.
Smith, Hotchkiss and Jake Bricknell had the Guelph goals.
Kitchener also feasted on Guelph’s inexperienced third and fourth lines, something due in part to the absence of the injured James McEwan and Nate Schnarr.
The Storm will host the Peterborough Petes Friday on GuelphToday book drive night, with new and gently used books donated going to the Salvation Army’s Christmas Hamper program.
Saturday is a rare 4 p.m. home game against the London Knights on Todd Bertuzzi night.
Box score: Kitchener 6 Guelph 3
