The Sarnia Sting and Windsor Spitfires played a competitive game against one another during their season opener.
At home for the Spitfires Thursday night, the Sting wasted no time getting themselves acquainted on the ice. Sarnia skater Theo Hill scored the team's first goal with assists from Justin O'Donnell and Ashton Reeser 3:23 minutes into first. About two minutes later, Ryder McIntyre found the net giving Sarnia a 2-0 lead on Windsor.
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Heading into the second period, the Spitfires evened the game up with two power play goals by Pasquale Zito. Zito's first score came early in the second frame with Kyle McDonald as the primary assist, the second shot was made with just over seven minutes left in the period when Will Cuylle slid the puck over to Zito tying things up 2-2.
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Not even a minute later, Sting centre Nolan Burke broke the tie and edged Windsor 3-2 to end the second period. Sarnia continued to bring the heat going into the third period with another two goals within a minute of each other. The Sting grabbed a fourth goal thanks to Nolan Dann and Alex Geci before Burke scored his second shot and the team's fifth goal with help from Andrei Malyavin.
Minutes after the fifth goal, Sarnia's McIntyre tried his luck with the net again and was seemingly successful, until referees determined the play was offside and the goal was called off. The Spits continued to trail behind the Sting forcing goalie Kyle Downey to take the net in place of Xavier Medina.
The Sting didn't let up though when Hill put a sixth goal on the board. While Sarnia's defense was strong, Ethan Miedema took a chance for Windsor with less than five minutes left in the game and it paid off when his shot, with an assist from McDonald knocked the team up one more point and capped off the game 6-3.
Sting goalie Ben Gaudreau made an impressive 29 saves of 32 shots on net by the Spitfires, while Windsor saved 31 shots.
Sarnia will take on Windsor again at home on Friday giving the Spitfires a chance for redemption. Puck drops at the Progressive Auto Sales Arena at 7:05 p.m.