Three goals from Jake Marchment including one just 49 seconds into the game helped power the OHL’s top ranked Erie Otters past the Guelph Storm by a score of 6-1 on Monday afternoon in front of a season high Family Day crowd of 4,900 at the Sleeman Centre.

The Storm found themselves a man short just 40 seconds into the game with Givani Smith off for goaltender interference. It would take the Otters man advantage just 9 seconds before Marchment put the puck past Michael Giugovaz for the quick 1-0 lead. Just over a minute later at 1:56 a Storm defensive miscue led to Arizona Coyotes first round pick Dylan Strome to walk out in front of Giugovaz all alone and snap the puck past for a two goal Erie lead less than two minutes into the game.

The Storm luckily responded quickly after the Otters had a miscue of their own sending the puck in front of their own net with Liam Stevens waiting to pick up the puck in front of a sprawled out Devon Williams to cut the Otters lead to 2-1 at 6:49.

From there on out fans were treated to an entertaining opening period with lots of end to end action with Giugovaz and Williams coming up with big saves for both sides. The Storm managed to hit the post twice in 30 seconds when a point shot from Garrett McFadden just caught the iron while moments later Storm leading scorer James McEwan broke through the Otters defence before the sound of frozen rubber hitting metal rang through the ears of 4,900 people.

Despite digging themselves into the early hole the Storm played their best hockey of the weekend during the games opening twenty minutes down by a 2-1 score heading into the middle frame.

While the pace of the game slowed down in the second perod the Storm seemed to hang with the Otters and kept up hope for the possibility of an upset. The Storm unfortunately could never gain sustained momentum due to their several trips to the penalty box, four during the second period alone, including three in a 8 minute stretch. The Otters would find the twine at 17:06 to take the wind out of the Storm’s sails during a 4 on 2 rush. Jake Marchment put away his second goal of the game with a bullet that flew over the glove of Giugovaz to bring the score to 3-1 through two periods.

Much like Saturday night in Barrie all doubt in the games outcome ended early in third as overage forward Nick Betz burried a rebound from Erik Cernak after Giugovaz couldn’t quite get all the way across his crease at 1:58. Vanya Lodina put the game totally out of reach at 9:36 when he deflected a Kyle Maksimovich shot to bring the score to 5-1. The exlimation mark came with just 38 seconds remaining in the game when Jake Marchment collected the hat trick with his 20^th goal of the season. The goal also gave Marchment power play markers during the first and final minutes of the game to help Erie to a 6-1 victory snapping a 3 game losing streak.

The Storm only managed to score four goals during the three game weekend set. They are on pace for 155 goals for this season. The league record for fewest goals in a season is 154.

The Storm once again played the game short with only 10 forwards in the line up. As reported by Tony Saxon from GuelphToday.ca Kyle West sat out the game with concussion like symptoms as a result of a check from Travis Konecney in Friday’s 6-2 loss to Sarnia. Also as reported by Tony Saxon, Storm overage forward Jacob Harris will find out his fate for the remainder of the season on Tuesday when he visits a concussion specialist in Toronto. Harris has been symptom free since just a few days after being hit by Max Jones during a game in London on January 9.

The Storm return to action this weekend with a home and home series on tap against midwest division rivals the Owen Sound Attack. The teams will faceoff Friday night at the Sleeman Centre at 7:30PM before heading up highway 6 on Saturday to the Harry Lumley Bayshore Community Centre for another 7:30PM puck drop.

STORM NOTES:

• Guelph’s overall record falls to 11-36-4-2

• Guelph’s home record falls to 8-17-1-1

• The Storm went 0 for 5 on the power play while Erie was 2 for 10

• James McEwan had a team high 6 shots on goal

• McEwan also led the way in the faceoff circle going 14 for 26 for Guelph

• The loss was the first for Guelph on the Family Day holiday since February 20, 2012 when they fell to the Kitchener Rangers also by a score of 6-1

• The Storm have a all time record of 4-4-0-0 on Family Day Monday since the holiday was introduced in Ontario for the first time in 2009

• The Storm have played at the Sleeman Centre for all 8 of their Family Day games

• Liam Stevens goal was his fourth of the season but first on home ice, Stevens collected a pair of goals during a 6-4 win in Peterborough on December 31 before scoring a goal during a 4-2 victory in Saginaw on January 31

• The Storm have a record of 0-3-1-0 against the Erie Otters this season, their lone point coming on December 29^th a 2-1 overtime loss at the Sleeman Centre

• The Storm and Otters meet two more times this season, the games will take place in the form of a home and home series on Friday March 11 and Saturday March 12 in Guelph and Erie respectively

• Guelph’s magic number is now 7, any combination of 7 Saginaw wins or 7 Guelph losses will mathematically eliminate the Storm from 2016 playoff contention thus ending Guelph’s current 23 year streak of playoff berths