A first-period major penalty proved costly for the Saginaw Spirit, and the Soo Greyhounds made sure it helped decide the game

After a disappointing result on the road on Wednesday night in which he felt his best players had a tough night, John Dean saw a difference in those players on Friday night.

The Soo Greyhounds leaders stepped up in important situations, and it ultimately helped lift the team to a 5-1 win over the Saginaw Spirit Friday at the GFL Memorial Gardens.

The win gave the Greyhounds a split of the back-to-back games between the two clubs that saw the Spirit win in Saginaw on Wednesday night.

“There was a lot of talk around play. We were very happy with our game on Wednesday outside of execution and in terms of finishing our chances,” Dean said. “We like the way we’re playing. We played another good game here today. Brady Martin sets the tone with a huge hit early in the game (and) obviously a couple big goals from him. Carter (George) came up in a big way. All of the leaders we challenged to be good were very good tonight.”

Overall, Dean said there were a lot of areas to be happy with for the Greyhounds in the victory.

“Our relentlessness on the forecheck (stood out). We made a couple of adjustments in the neutral zone and a couple adjustments in the offensive zone, and we thought our guys did very well,” Dean said. “It was a big challenge we asked of our players is we wanted to treat the Saginaw back-to-back (like playoffs). We thought we played a good game and we lost (Wednesday). That’s going to happen in the playoffs. We’re going to have to make quick adjustments and we’re going to have one day to do it and sometimes no days to do it. Just like playoffs.”

Spirit coach Chris Lazary was succinct in his assessment of his club in the setback.

“We just didn’t play well,” Lazary said.

“Didn’t like our game in general,” Lazary also said. “We couldn’t really get anything going. It wasn’t a great group effort for our team, but we move on.”

Both coaches also discussed a major penalty to Spirit defenceman Graydon Jones in the opening period that carried over into the second period. The Greyhounds scored twice on the man advantage to turn a 2-0 lead into 4-0 in the early minutes of the second period.

“We talked a lot about what does it look like in the playoffs when we have an opportunity to put a team away on the power play,” Dean said. “Credit to the power play. They go out and take care of business, score two and that’s the game for us. Very happy with the start of the second period, with how definitive and clean it was.”

Lazary spoke of the Spirit not being able to get any momentum from a potential kill of the major.

“(The Greyhounds) scored on the power play,” Lazary said. “They did their job.”

The Greyhounds got on the board first as Martin beat Spirit goaltender Stepan Shurygin from in close as he redirected the puck past the Saginaw netminder off an initial chance by Jordan Charron at 11:35.

Spencer Evans made it a 2-0 game 1:37 later as he beat Shurygin through traffic on a one-timer from the point off a pass from Noah Laus.

Jones was given a major penalty late in the opening period for a knee-on-knee hit on Sault defenceman Harris Pangretitsch, the Greyhounds scored a pair of power play goals early in the second period to extend the lead further.

Martin scored 50 seconds into the period as he circled the net and dove for a rebound from below the goalline off a shot by Jeremy Martin and batted the puck past Shurygin to make it 3-0.

Quinn McKenzie made it a 4-0 game 1:09 later as he redirected a shot by Colin Fitzgerald from the top of the right circle past Shurygin.

With the teams playing four-on-four, Callum Croskery gave the Greyhounds a 5-0 lead at 3:22 as he took a shot from the top of the left faceoff circle that beat Shurygin glove side.

Early in the third period with the teams again playing four-on-four, the Spirit got on the board. Nikita Klepov skated into the left circle and took a shot that beat Carter George 2:04 into the third period.

In addition to the two-goal night from Brady Martin, Sault defenceman Jakub Winkelhofer assisted on a pair of goals in the win.

George made 19 saves for the Greyhounds.

Shurygin made 29 saves for the Spirit in two periods of work before being replaced by Kaleb Papineau, who stopped all 10 shots he faced the rest of the way.

The Greyhounds will wrap up their regular season schedule on Sunday afternoon as the team hosts the Windsor Spitfires.

With a record of 39-22-1-5, the Greyhounds sit one point behind the London Knights for fourth in the OHL’s Western Conference standings after London beat Windsor in a shootout on Friday night at home.

The Knights also have one game remaining, a matchup with the Flint Firebirds on Saturday night. A win in that game would clinch fourth for the Knights and give them home ice advantage in their opening round playoff series with the Greyhounds.

With Friday’s loss, the Spirit fall to 26-34-3-4.