The Soo Thunderbirds did not come prepared to battle.
Despite jumping out to a 3-0 lead, the Thunderbirds fell 6-5 to the Northern Michigan Black Bears in Northern Ontario Junior Hockey League action on Wednesday night at the John Rhodes Community Centre.
Kyle Jacobson scored the game winner for the Black Bears with 5:53 remaining as the Northern Michigan forward dug the puck out of a scrum in the corner and skated in untouched and beat goaltender Matt Hache with a deke to give his team a 6-4 lead.
With Hache on the bench in favour of an extra attacker, Jeff Elliott scored with 1:01 remaining to pull the Thunderbirds back to within a goal but it proved to be too little too late.
Thunderbirds head coach Toots Kovacs was upset with his team's play after the game and said that his players will need to look at themselves in order to rebound for Friday night's game against the Manitoulin Wild.
"Even tough we came up with a 3-0 lead in the first period, I don't think we played very well," said Kovacs. "We were outworked and we lost all the little battles and I think this was one of our worst games of the year right from the goaltending out.
"Our forwards did not forecheck with any tenacity and on their last goal, a guy walks right out from the corner. To be successful you can't have that. You have to win the little battles and we didn't do that tonight. It's up to the players to come out and execute."
Matt Caria's 13th goal of the season opened the scoring at the 4:01 mark of the second period as Matt Dias, who scored five goals in a win over North Bay on Sunday, forced Northern Michigan goaltender Tony Stoehr out of position before Caria gobbled up the loose puck.
NOJHL scoring leader Ryan Maunu snapped a long shot inside the post before Tyler Lannigan scored his first of the year on an 80 foot blast that deflected off Stoehr's blocker to give the Thunderbirds a 3-0 lead.
Lannigan's goal chased Stoehr from the game in favour of Kirk Panik.
Northern Michigan began to take control of the game in the second period as Jacobson, with his first of the game, Russell Law and John Nogatch on the power play scored to tie the game at 3-3 heading into the second intermission.
Nogatch was playing in his first game of the season after rejoining the Black Bears from the Lake Superior State University Lakers.
Mike Herbert collected a rebound at the side of the net and beat Hache to give the Black Bears a 4-3 lead just 36 seconds into the third period.
Justin Shelleby's shot through traffic tied the game at 4-4 for the T-Birds before Northern Michigan's Ryan Behnke fired a shot from the left boards off the draw past Hache to setup Jacobson's game winner.
Dias added a pair of assists for the Thunderbirds as did Caria and Drew Jarrett. Jordan Bowman recorded a pair of helpers for the Black Bears while Sault product Bryan Pearse, a recent acquisition, setup another.
Each team fired 34 shots at each other.
Derek MacKay made his return to the Thunderbirds lineup on Wednesday and is also expected to be in the lineup on Friday.
The Black Bears win creates an even bigger log jam in the NOJHL's western division. The Thunderbirds (11-8-1-1) share top spot with the Wild (11-7-0-2) with 24 points while Blind River (10-8-1-1) and Northern Michigan (9-6-3-1) sit just two points back.
Manitoulin and Blind River each hold a game in hand on the Thunderbirds while the Black Bears hold two.
Game time on Friday against the Wild is 7:30 p.m. at the Rhodes.
Elsewhere in the NOJHL on Wednesday, Ben Robichaud and Justin Lacey scored three goals each to lead the Rayside Balfour Sabrecats past the Sudbury Northern Wolves 11-4.
PHOTO: Thunderbirds forward Matt Dias (#15) gets a scoring chance in front of Black Bears goaltender Kirk Panik. (All photos courtesy of Jim Egan.)