St. Catharines, ON – A pair of third period goals was the difference as the Mustangs pulled out a 3-2 win over the Brock Badgers in Game 1 of the OUA West semi-final.
 
Western opened the scoring in the 1^st period off of a Spenser Cobbold goal. Cobbold picked the puck up in the neutral zone, skated over the Brock blue line and beat a screened Logan Thompson over the blocker side to make it 1-0 Mustangs. Jonathan Laser & Trevor Waarnar with the assists on the goal.
 
The Mustangs would fire 14 shots at the Brock goal in the 1^st period and led 1-0 through 20 minutes.
 
In the 2^nd period the Badgers would get on the board just over a minute into the frame. Tyler Rollo scored on the powerplay to even the game at 1-1.
 
The Badgers would get their first lead of the game at the 7-minute mark when Connor Brown scored to make it 2-1 Brock.
 
The Badgers responded with 14 shots of their own in the 2^nd period and held the 2-1 lead.
 
In the 3^rd period the Mustangs put the offensive pressure on. After Brock took a penalty, Western capitalized quickly as Kyle Petit would get the re-direct in front of the Badgers goal and tie the game at 2-2 just 8 seconds into the man advantage. Trevor Warnaar got the lone assist.
 
Western wasn't done. Less than 2 minutes later the Mustangs would win the face-off and drive hard to the goal. Ethan Szypula would provide the distraction in front of the net and Cordell James grabbed the puck and banked it off the Badgers goaltender and in to regain the lead at 3-2.
 
Brock would pull their goaltender with just over a minute left in regulation but weren't able to convert and Western secured the 3-2 win and the 1-0 series lead.
 
Game 2 of the series is at Thompson Arena Friday night for a 7:00pm puck-drop.