Photo: James Paddle-Grant/Freestyle Photography/OSHC
Black Bears fans, coaches, and players — and really, anyone who found themselves inside of Canadian Tire Centre on Saturday night — might need to book visits to their cardiologists on Monday (thanks, Dan MacRae, for the suggestion).
Down as many as five goals to the Oshawa FireWolves at the beginning of the fourth quarter, the Black Bears staged a frenetic comeback, scoring eight goals in the frame, including four in a span of 1:36 of game time.
As chants of ‘Let’s go Black Bears’ rained down from the season-high 4,901 fans in attendance, Connor Kearnan quick-sticked a pass from Jeff Teat with only 13 seconds left to play, sending Ottawa to the team’s first-ever overtime since the franchise moved to Ottawa.
Under two minutes into overtime, Reilly O’Connor — who had already netted his second hat trick of the season — potted his fourth goal of the game, sending a bounce shot between FireWolves netminder Doug Jamieson’s legs.
“It’s just crazy, amazing, man,” said a soaked O’Connor after the game (he was the beneficiary of a water cooler dump while being interviewed on-field by sideline reporter Brianne Foley).
“A little sloppy, but just got it done, found a way to get it done. A pretty memorable game, for sure.”
O’Connor’s overall game on Saturday stands out as the best performance of the career season he is enjoying at the age of 32. In addition to the four goals that counted, he had another disallowed because it was milliseconds after the shot clock expired. O’Connor also added two assists.
“He’s just the best,” said defender Callum Jones of O’Connor. “He probably has the best lacrosse mind of everybody in that room. He sees the game in a different capacity than anyone else. His composure, his leadership, his preparation — he’s just the complete package.
“And once again, having [Teat] work with him, [Teat] draws so much protection, so that he can kind of slip through the cracks a little bit, and that’s what happened there, [O’Connor] slipped through the cracks. He’s just such a special player, a special person, and he’s a big role model for me.”
Jones strengthened his case for Defensive Player of the Year with a breakaway goal in the second quarter while causing a game-high three turnovers and scooping 11 loose balls.
In total, three of the Black Bears’ first four goals came from the back door, with Nicholas Volkov also capitalizing on a breakaway and Kevin Brownell scoring on a feed from Larson Sundown to open the scoring way back in the first quarter.
“It’s something that we always try to be better at, pushing the ball,” said Jones. “Catching some O guys on D by getting up the floor, it’s been a focus for us, and it’s just, a blind dog finds a bone every once in a while, right?”
Dan MacRae said after the game that the team’s faith never wavered. “Yeah, the last two minutes was nuts, for sure. The message on the bench was, keep believing,” he said.
“We were just under 10 minutes, just saying we were trying to get it to under two [goals] before the next TV timeout. I give the guys credit, there was belief on the bench the whole way, even though maybe how far-fetched it seemed when you’re down four with two minutes to go. But that’s a credit to the guys on the floor and their mentality. That’s a special win that hopefully we can use for a lot of momentum going forward.”
Down that stretch run, the crowd came alive and helped fuel the comeback. “That’s definitely the loudest I’ve ever heard CTC,” said Jones.
“You could feel it in the fourth, the crowd came alive,” said O’Connor. “We came alive, they felt, I think, that pressure, and we just rode it.”
“It helps. It helps a lot. Yeah, that’s the loudest I’ve heard them, for sure, this season, when [Kearnan] scored that one to tie things up,” said MacRae.
“We want more of that, man, it’s such a good product. That team over there, they played phenomenal tonight. I know what their record shows, it’s not indicative of that team. They’re 2-10 now, and we’re what, 7-5, and they play any team in the league tight. So, this league is such a great product. No matter what game you come to, you’re in for a good show. So, happy we were able to do that and happy they were able to give us a lot of momentum in the fourth.”
With the win, the Black Bears have now won three straight games for the first time since moving to Ottawa. O’Connor has scored two of the past three game winners and assisted on four more this season. The forward has already eclipsed his goals, assists, and point totals and is on pace for 27 goals, 60 assists, and 87 points, all numbers that would match or eclipse his previous highs in a season.
Now, the Black Bears will play three straight games out west before returning home to play the Georgia Swarm on March 28 and the Toronto Rock on April 10. You can catch their games against Colorado (March 7), Calgary (March 14), and Vancouver (March 20) for free on NLL+.
“These types of wins, when you just find a way when it doesn’t seem like you can, when you’re going to have a special year, you need these kinds of wins. I was just saying we’ve got to use this as some rocket fuel for us, because we’re playing three of the top four teams in the next month,” said MacRae.
“And two of those are on the road. There’s no easy games, we’re going to the Mile High City there, we’re a fourth quarter team, you know, are our legs going to be there in the fourth, when we’re that far above sea level? We’ll see, but our guys are confident right now and they’re playing with a little bit of magic.”
This year, the Black Bears will play four Friday home games and five Saturday home games from November to April.
Next up at home is a Saturday meeting with Georgia on March 28 at Canadian Tire Centre.
You can view the team’s entire schedule here, purchase Season Seats here, and Single Game tickets here.
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