Mid-December junior games can, at times, be just a little sleepy.

With Christmas fast approaching, the lads on the ice occasionally find themselves looking for ways to cruise through their sixty minutes of hockey and get back to enjoying the festive environment of the holidays.

For a good part of the Kirkland Lake Gold Miners visit to the nickel city, taking on the Greater Sudbury Cubs Thursday at the Gerry McCrory Sports Complex, the matchup was a relatively tame affair - until the final minute of play in period two.

A stoppage at 19:36 produced a pair of fighting majors and no less than three separate (five-minute) match penalty calls, all on the same whistle. Oh yes - the Cubs would edge the Gold Miners 3-2 in overtime when Mason Walker drilled home his 17 goal of the season.

Noah Kohan (Sudbury) and Quinton Pagé (K Lake) traded goals in the first and Owen van de Ven (K Lake) and Kaedyn Long (Sudbury) did likewise in the middle stanza as the Cubs outshot the Gold Miners 37-27.

Goaltenders were front and centre as newly-acquired Iain Wintle earned first star honours for the Cubs (25 saves) while Jayden Claveau turned aside 34 of the 37 shots that he faced at the other end of the rink.

Sudbury is on the road on Saturday, facing the Espanola Paper Kings before closing out their 2025 schedule with back to back home games on Wednesday (Powassan Voodoos) and Thursday (French River Rapids).