LONDON, Ont. – After 65 minutes of play couldn't decide a winner it all came down to the shootout, with the York Lions claiming a 5-4 win over the Western Mustangs on Friday night at Thompson Arena.
 
"I think when you look across the entire game it was a real solid effort on our behalf," said Mustangs head coach Clarke Singer. "We got behind a couple of times but showed a lot of character and grit coming back to tie it up. When you get to an overtime or shootout there's going to be chances both ways. We were proud of the guys for battling back and now we just got to learn from that a little bit and hopefully comeback against Toronto tomorrow and get two points."
 
The loss moves the Mustangs to 3-5-1 on the year, while the Lions improve to 8-2-0 to stay in first place in the OUA West.
 
Four different Mustangs marked their name on the scoresheet on Friday with Spenser Cobbold, Rob Polesello, Cordell James, and Mitchell Brooks all hitting the back of the net. The Lions used a similarly balanced attack with Trevor Petersen, Dexter Bricker, Alex Mowbray, and Derek Sheppard all scoring in regulation.
 
Cobbold started the scoring for the Mustangs early on with a shot to the top corner in the fifth minute of play. Western kept the lead until the second period where York tied the game less than a minute into the frame on a goal from Petersen. The Lions netted two more goals just after the midway point, with Bricker and Mowbray scoring at 11:22 and 13:18 to put the visiting side up 3-1.
 
Polesello responded a little more than a minute after Mowbray's goal with his third marker of the year to send the game into the intermission with the Lions up 3-2.
 
The Lions extended their lead to 4-2 with another opening minute goal as Sheppard converted assists from Colton Vannucci and Kyle Campbell just 50 seconds into the third.
 
James then answered back a few minutes later for the Mustangs, scoring not only a shorthanded goal but also the first of his OUA career.
 
"I thought this game was good," said James, "It was pretty nice to see what we can do out there, I think we could handle any team we could play. Obviously we didn't get the outcome we wanted but we battled hard the whole game."
 
Brooks then tied things up for the purple and white less than a minute later, stepping out of the penalty box and scoring a top corner goal to send the game to overtime tied at 4-4.
 
After overtime was able to solve nothing, the two teams went to the shootout. Cobbold provided the only goal for the Mustangs, while both Scott Feser and Sheppard scored for the Lions to give York a 5-4 win.
 
"We talked about a number of areas after Wednesday that we have to improve in to be successful," said Singer, "I thought in all three of those areas we discussed before the game the guys did a great job. We just have to take that effort and commitment forward. I thought tonight we relied on our work ethic a lot more than our skill and that showed a lot in our performance."
 
The Mustangs will be back in action Saturday, November 10, in Toronto where they will face off against the Toronto Varsity Blues for the second time this week. Fans can tune in to all the action live on OUA.tv