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Sports

Kitchener Comes Back to Defeat Plymouth, 6-5

Whalers host Saginaw at 2 p.m. today at Compuware Arena.

The Kitchener Rangers scored three goals in the third period to erase a 4-3 Plymouth lead and the Rangers hung on to defeat the Whalers, 6-5, in an Ontario Hockey League game played before 3,030 on Saturday night at .

Kitchener improves to 36-15-1-0, good for 73 points and second place in the West Division, third seed in the Western Conference.  Plymouth is now 35-15-2-1, also good for 73 points and first place in the West Division, second seed in the Western Conference.

Second star Andrew Crescenzi scored twice (16-17) in the third period for Kitchener and Ryan Murphy once (9).  First star Michael Catenacci scored goal (21) and added two assists for the Rangers, while Ben Thomson (9) and Cody Sol (12) scored one goal apiece.

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Third star Stefan Noesen scored twice for Plymouth (23-24) and Alex Aleardi (28), Danny Vanderwiel (4) and J.T. Miller (21) scored singles for the Whalers.

Tonight's game featured the best road team in the OHL in Kitchener (now 20-9-0-0) against the league's best home team in the Whalers (now 19-4-1-1 at Compuware Arena).  The contest featured three distinct mometum swings.

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Although the shots were even in the first period at eight aside, Kitchener raced to a 3-0 lead after twenty minutes on goals by Cantenacci (0:56), Sol (shorthanded at 14:23) and Thomson (18:58).

But Plymouth came roaring back with four unaswered goals in the second period to lead 4-3.  

Aleardi started the Plymouth comeback at 3:43 of the second frame, skating with speed into the Kitchener zone on the right wing and tucking a snap shot over the shoulder of Kitchener goaltender Jack Moylan. Vanderwiel cut the Rangers' lead to 3-2 at 9:43, going hard to the net and deflecting a feed from Michael Whaley as he was being checked.  Noesen tied the game at 3-3 at 14:49, redirecting Aleardi's pass from the right circle to the left side of the Kitchener goal. Miller gave Plymouth their first lead at 4-3 with 0:48 left in the period, scoring on a tip of Colin MacDonald point shot from the hashmarks.

"The boys came out with a lot of fire in the second period and crashed the net hard and threw our bodies around," Vanderwiel said. (On his goal) Coach Don (Elland) was telling me to go to the net, throw my body around and finish hard.  I saw 'Wales' get the puck and put my head down and skated to the net, hoping that the puck would hit off my stick. It went in the net."

Traling 4-3 at the start of the third period, Kitchener came back to tie the game at 4-4 at 8:01 when Murphy skated into the Plymouth zone and buried the shot past Whalers goaltender Scott Wedgewood.  Crescenzi gave Kitchener a 5-4 lead at 9:27, skating from the right goal line and shoveling the puck to the Plymouth blue ice.  The puck seemed to deflect off a Plymouth player and into the net. Crescenzi scored again at 10:20 on a Kitchener power play to give the Rangers a 6-4 lead when he was set up directly in front of Wedgewood and scored on a low shot.

Plymouth had one goal left and Noesen cut the Kitchener lead to 6-5 at 13:06, digging for the puck around the blue ice and tapping home the puck from the left post.

Still trailing, 6-5 with 1:23 remaining and a faceoff in the Kitchener zone, Associate coach Joe Stefan called a timeout and pulled Wedgewood in favor of the extra attacker.  The Whalers had several opportunities, but could not find the equalizer.

Kitchener outshot Plymouth, 44-38.

The Whalers are right back at it at 2 p.m. today at Compuware Arena against Saginaw (1:50 p.m., www.plymouthwhalers.com).  Plymouth will get four players back in the lineup.  Cody Payne, Mitch Jones, Matt Mistele and Mitchell Dempsey will all return from a two-game suspension for the game this afternoon.

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