London, ON – The Mustangs started the weekend with a tough 4-2 loss to Toronto on Friday night.
"It's like every game lately, we seem to get to the last 7 or 8 minutes and it's tight and close and I thought we deserved a lot better tonight," said Mustangs Head Coach Clarke Singer "We carried most of the play early in the third there but then the penalties kind of got the best of us and I think we had a bunch of good aspects to this one but just couldn't find a way to get it done,"
Western opened the scoring first on the night as Ethan Browne picked up a rebound in the Toronto end, rounded the back of the net and then wristed a shot into the Varsity Blues goal to put the Mustangs up 1-0 just over 4 minutes into the game.
"We kind of missed the puck there and got the puck behind the net and just fired it short side and it went in," said Browne post-game.
Later in the frame, Western would go down a man on a too-many-men call and Toronto would respond, evening the score at 1-1 after 20 minutes.
Both sides would remain locked a 1-1 through 40 minutes.
The Mustangs found themselves in penalty trouble again at the midway point of the third period, after Andrew Bruder got called for cross-checking, Toronto would convert just over a minute later to take a 2-1 lead.
Under a minute later Toronto would find the back of the net again and to take a 3-1 lead.
"We can't let it get to that point where we are down two goals with a few minutes left, that's not a receipt for success," said Singer "I thought we battled, we hit a couple of posts and had a few blocks and screens, hopefully the kharma starts going our way soon,"
Western wasn't ready to pack it in though, staying hard on the puck in the Varsity Blues zone, Michael Boushy picked off the puck behind the Toronto net and then Franco Sproviero skated the puck along the wing and then fed Eric Van Impe in the slot who fired the puck into the Toronto cage to cut the lead to one goal.
Both sides battled in the final minutes of the game, with the Western net empty Toronto would get the final tally of the night to take the 4-2 win.
Western has a quick turnaround as they are headed to Guelph Saturday night for a 7:30pm puck drop against the Gryphons. Fans can watch the action on OUA.tv.
