In the week following the closing of the OHL Trade Deadline, the Sudbury Wolves dropped a fourth straight game, 2-1, to the North Bay Battalion. Over the course of the next five to six weeks, the Wolves never lost more than two games in a row.

A tough schedule this past week saw the Wolves edge the high-flying Flint Firebirds in overtime, but then fall to both the London Knights and Soo Greyhounds. A rough third period on Friday against North Bay extended their skid to three games heading into a Sunday afternoon home match-up with the Kingston Frontenacs.

Tied after forty minutes of play for a third straight game, the local juniors pulled this one out late, with an Artem Gonchar shot finding its way through traffic with 1:07 to play and Gavin Ewles adding an empty-netter on his birthday to give Sudbury a 5-3 win.

“We’ve got a resilient group that wants to play for each other,” said head coach Scott Barney, his squad increasing the lead over the Brampton Steelheads in the battle for the final playoff spot to a relatively comfortable 11-point margin. “No matter who is in, whose out, whose in net, I think the guys believe in each other.”

“After a tough third period last game, the guys came out with a great start again – and that’s a credit to the whole group.”

In fact, Chase Coughlan opened the scoring for the homeside less than a minute in, with Vladimir Provorov increasing the lead to 2-0 to end period one.

Nolan Buttar (Fronts) and Daniel Berehowsky traded tallies early in the middle stanza before some penalty trouble for the Wolves – they were assessed only five minor penalties all game but were hit with a 5 on 3 penalty kill for almost two full minutes – opened the door for the visitors.

Goals by Matthew Frost and Tomas Pobezal evened the contest at 3-3, setting the stage for Gonchar and company to pull this one out of the fire late. For all the excitement of those final 67 seconds of play, coach Barney insisted that keeping things highly uneventful is at the forefront of the messaging the players are receiving, day in and day out.

“Our biggest message is playing every shift the right way,” said Barney. “I don’t think we are a team that can just change things; that’s not in our DNA with the guys that we have. Playing the right way is being predictable: rinse, repeat, rinse, repeat. It can be boring sometimes, but it can win you hockey games.”

Though he has just 44 games of OHL experience under his belt, rugged soon-to-be 18 year-old blueliner Brady Smith has clearly taken this messaging to heart. “As the games go along and you get more time on the ice, more time with the puck, it’s all about consistency,” said Smith, a native of Oshawa.

“At the beginning of the year, you might make one out of three good plays, where you’re doing the right things, having the right habits one out of three times. As you go along, you do it more and more and that’s really what gets you more ice time and helps the team – when you’re consistent.”

“That’s something I have really focused on is being consistent on what I want to bring to the table.”

And it’s the second half of that answer that lies at the heart of what Brady Smith is most pleased with in terms of his overall performance in his rookie campaign. “I really like that I have been carving out a role that I am good at, finding myself on the penalty kill, being able to contribute out there, becoming trustworthy so my coaches can put me out there.”

Again with the predictability and consistency.

So, are there times where the staff will allow the players to sway from this grid?

“We don’t want these guys to be robots out there,” said coach Barney. “These are hockey players and they’re young. In the D zone and neutral zone, these are non-negotiable. When you get to the O Zone, we have non-negotiables, but we want the players to have some freedom with the puck, we want them to create.”

“You take that away and the guys won’t be able to make hockey plays.”

One of said players on the Wolves is clearly Hudson Chitaroni, a third round pick two years ago who returned from a lengthy injury and made his presence felt on both weekend home games.

“It felt pretty good,” said Chitaroni. “Pretty gassed at the end, but it felt good.”

As his return to the lineup drew nearer, the 18 year-old from Sault Ste Marie increased his preparation. “I worked with Desi (Andrew Desjardins – assistant coach) a lot and he was really good – and we got to do everything game-like.”

Chitaroni comes back to a different team from the one he last played with, pre trade deadline, a younger squad with greater opportunity for the likes of the young man who racked up 77 points as a 15 year-old with the Greater Sudbury Cubs last year.

“I’ve got to take on a bigger role with us losing some key players,” he said. “Maybe defense, maybe scoring. It doesn’t really matter, you’ve got to do it all.”

And do it all predictably.