Photo courtesy of James Egan Photography

The Soo Greyhounds officially kicked off the 2012-13 season on Thursday Night with a home exhibition contest against the Sudbury Wolves.
For the Northern Ontario rivals the game marked the first of two pre-season meetings between the two clubs as the Hounds will visit Sudbury a week from tomorrow (Friday) in the Nickel City.

Matt Murray would get the start in goal for the Hounds, while Sudbury would respond with Taylor Dupuis between the pipes.

Early in the first, Murray would be forced to make a big pad stop on Wolves winger Brody Silk with approximately 30 seconds remaining on Sudbury's first powerplay of the game.
And from there the visitors gained some early momentum taking a 6-0 shot lead before the game was five minutes old.

Scoring would open following another Wolves man advantage, when Hound forward Alex Morgan (16) put the locals ahead 1-0 with the assists going to Trent Mallette and Tyler Ganly.
The shot gap quickly closed resulting in the Hounds being rewarded with a two-goal cushion.

After keeping the puck inside the Sudbury blueline, the Hounds converted on a nice looking three-way passing play that ended with OA forward Brandon Alderson putting the puck upstairs, gloveside for a 2-0 lead.

Then late in the period, Alderson was within inches of his second of the night with under five minutes remaining.  After letting a shot go off the right wing, the puck started to trickle past Dupuis but the Wolves netminder gathered possession to keep the score at a two goal difference.

At the other end of the Essar Centre ice, Murray stopped one of his 14 shots against in the period turning aside a one-time shot from Nick Baptiste with less than three minutes left in the period.

 The Hounds would skate into the dressing room after the 1st period with the 2-0 lead.

In the second, and before the period was 6 minutes old, newly-acquired defenseman Alex Gudbranson, and former Hound Chad Thibodeau would acquaint themselves resulting in each player receiving a game misconduct as a result of fighting in a pre-season contest.

Zach McFadden put the visitors on the board at the 9:07 mark, notching a shorthanded goal for the Wolves but the Hounds would regain their two goal lead.
David Broll was sent in on a breakaway just over four minutes later, while playing 4-on-4, and made no mistake beating Dupuis and the Hounds lead now sat at a 3-1.

The Hounds roster would lose further veteran presence with less than ten seconds in the 2nd period when Alderson was assessed a 5-minute major for a check to the head.

Hounds outshot Sudbury 13-11 in the period and held a 3-1 lead.

Sudbury forward Jake Ryan used an early third period powerplay to put a rebound over the glove hand of Murray from the slot to trim the Hounds lead to a goal.  The goal marked the lone goal against the Hounds during the Wolves 5-minute man advantage.

Just under five minutes later Dominik Kubalik beat Murray from the face-off circle to his left, and the visiting Wolves had erased the Hounds lead.

The two teams would skate scoreless over the remaining 13 minutes of the period and eventually force a shootout.
(There is no overtime in OHL pre-season play, and all tied games go directly to a shootout).

In the shootout, the visiting Wolves would score on their 1st and 3rd shooter while Hounds forward David Broll would be the lone player to beat Dupuis, resulting in a 4-3 shootout loss for the Hounds.

The Hounds will continue their pre-season play this coming Saturday, August 8th when they head on the road to Saginaw to take on the Spirit.  Game time is 7:11 p.m. at the Dow Event Center.

HOUNDS SCRATCHES;
33 Millen, 6 Miller, 11 Dempsey, 23 Kirkup, 28 Halagian along with Quesnele, Fuller and Tolchinsky

SCORING SUMMARY
1st Period
SSM - 5:01 - 16 Alex Morgan (1) from 18 Trent Mallette and 3 Tyler Ganly
SSM - 12:26 - 21 Brandon Alderson (1) from 19 Jared McCann and 5 Ryan Sproul

2nd Period
SBY - 9:07 - 4 Zach McFadden from Jacob Harris (SH)
SSM - 13:40 - 17 David Broll (1) from 14 Cody Mintz and 9 Dylan Staples

3rd Period
SBY - 1:41 - 2 Jake Ryan from 11 Mackenzie Braid and 21 Dominik Kahun (PP)
SBY - 6:20 - 15 Dominik Kubalik  from 2 Jake Ryan and 24 Evan De Haan

Shootout
SSM
19 - Jared McCann - NO GOAL
17 - David Broll - GOAL
9 - Dylan Staples - NO GOAL

SBY
16 - Jacob Harris - GOAL
94 - Brody Silk - NO GOAL
14 - Nick Baptiste - GOAL

SHOTS ON GOAL
Sudbury - 14-11-12=37
Sault Ste. Marie - 10-13-7=30

SCORE
Sudbury - 0-1-2-1S/O=4
Sault Ste. Marie - 2-1-0-0S/O=3

ATTENDANCE - 3394