Niagara IceDogs nab home-ice advantage on Carter Verhaeghe’s late snipe: OHL post-game questions

It was Last Shot Wins Sunday in three Eastern Conference games, as that literally happened in every game. Toronto Maple Leafs pick Carter Verhaeghe's last-minute winner pulled pesky Niagara level with North Bay. Favourites Kingston and Oshawa cashed in on overtime power plays to go up 2-0 respectively on the hard-luck Peterborough Petes and Mississauga Steelheads.

On with the post-game questions.

Eastern Conference

Kingston 5 Peterborough 4, overtime (Frontenacs lead 2-0, Petes host Game 3 on Tuesday) — While Kingston's 11-3 edge in power plays will be a talking point, what tweak by Todd Gill led to it getting a four-minute power play in OT? First of all, what a gamut that 17-year-old defenceman Roland McKeown ran on his way to scoring the decider 8:27 into extra time off a setup from top-ranked NHL draft prospect Sam Bennett (1G-2A, -1), who had three points in the game's final 30 minutes.

Midway through a four-minute power play awarded after Petes rookie defenceman Matt Spencer got his blade up into Ryan Kujawinski's mouth, McKeown fell down in the neutral zone and gifted the Petes' Hunter Garlent with a 100-foot breakaway. Garlent went high and it appeared Fronts goalie Matt Mahalak got just enough of the puck to save the game. About a minute later, McKeown scored after feinting toward the net to divert his check, Greg Betzold, and sliding out to the faceoff circle for Bennett's pass.

The penalty had to be called. Kujawinski was at full stride with a path to the goal when he was clipped up high. Getting back to the point, the call also came after Kingston had kicked the tempo up to 11 after Gill reunited the Bennett-Henri Ikonen-Spencer Watson trio that was his first line much of the season. Kingston came on strongly and had back-to-back 3-on-1 rushes against Andrew D'Agostini (39 saves) before drawing the call.

The Frontenacs, who forced OT on Robert Polesello's second of the night on a scramble with 49 seconds left, realized they were fortunate. The Petes probably deserve to be coming home with a split.

"We didn't have the quite the bounce we wanted in the first and second period but we got the job down," McKeown told TV Cogeco Kingston. "That goal in the last minute by Polesello really gave us momentum and it carried over.

"We got the benefit of the doubt tonight," McKeown added. "We had a lot of power plays [going 2-for-11 to the Petes' 0-for-3] and the puck movement wasn't there. We had a lot of power plays in the first game and we didn't score. We just had to focus and we knew the goals would come."

When will Nick Ritchie get untracked? The high NHL draft prospect who paced the Petes with 39 goals and 74 points in the regular season was very vocal with the refs in the aftermath of the overtime goal, earning the dreaded misconduct for abuse of an official. How much of that stemmed from disparity in power plays or from remorse at being a star in a slump at an importune time, no one knows. With no points in two games, Ritchie is a season-high-tying five-game goalless drought.

The 18-year-old was +1 on the night and was sound in his own end, sacrificing his body to take a point shot flush in the leg during that extended extra-skater edge that Kingston used to finish off the game. Peterborough needs him to score, though. The Orangeville, Ont., native put a shot over the net completely in the first period. That was almost as inexplicable as what Kingston was doing leaving Ritchie wide open for so long that had he had time to "build a fire and toast a marshmallow," as play-by-play announcer David Murphy put it.

Bennett has four points over two games, all coming in the third period or OT. Peterborough's second-most touted draft prospect, right wing Eric Cornel, also had two goals on Sunday.

How Ritchie, and 19 other players, work through it in the next 48 hours will decide whether the Jody Hull-coached Petes get back in the series.

The irony is the Petes were opportunists par excellence on Sunday. They scored in the first and last minutes of the first period. They had three shots in the second yet forged ahead 3-2 when Cornel beat Mahalak high.

Why should one believe the series is far, far from over? D'Agostini, plain and simple. The overage stopped 80-of-89 shots in the two games and. to cop the old cliché, was the most important penalty killer as the Petes went 12-for-14 at surviving while a man short. The Petes are in tough, especially with 19-year-old defenceman Brandon Devlin now out for the rest of their series, but they have a hot goalie in his last crack at a playoff run.

"What's great about him is the second effort he gives and the way he battles in the blue paint," McKeown told Cogeco. "He's great moving side to side on backdoor plays. We have to go up on him."

On Tuesday, the Petes will host their first post-season game since 2010. Surely that's enough reason for their fans to get psyched.

Niagara 3 North Bay 2 (series tied 1-1, IceDogs host Game 3 on Tuesday) — What macro reason explains why the young 'Dogs did not buckle after losing a two-goal lead, and yes, obviously real hockey reporters don't say "macro?" Remember back in November when IceDogs coach-GM Marty Williamson decided it was better to move his best potential graduating defenceman Jesse Graham sooner, rather than later? The payoff was that the Niagara had more minutes to allocate to the Pups, 17-year-olds Blake Siebenaler, Aaron Haydon, Vince Dunn and Aleksandar Mikulovich, whom collectively had a strong afternoon on Sunday.

Earlier in the season, Niagara might not have been able to recover from seeing a two-goal lead go poof in 32 seconds like it did in the first quadrant of the third period, when North Bay's Nick Paul and Brenden Miller scored. Instead, with Brent Moran fashioning a 34-of-36 night in net, Niagara dug in defensively and bided its time until it could make a push late in regulation. That paid off when Verhaeghe (1G-1A, +1) came out from behind the goal to score the winner with 41 seconds left.

What solace do the Battalion take after losing home-ice advantage? A loss to Niagara exhumes all the Brampton-era bones of past teams that had successful regular seasons and very short springs. Realistically, though, it might come back to motivation. The Battalion had a sprint finish to beat Barrie and Sudbury to the wire for the conference's No. 2 playoff seed. It had no trouble being at the optimal point for its first playoff opener in North Bay, where it won 4-0 on Friday to run its streak to seven.

Invariably, that motivation is going to dissipate, plus a team on a successful run will often succumb to temptation to be grandiose. The Battalion like to take the direct path to the goal, but had some extra pass-itis and extra move-itis on Sunday. It finally did find its form in the third; Paul, the Dallas Stars pick, was active physically in third.

The Battalion have the deeper and more seasoned team. At the same time, it allowed seventh-seeded Niagara to get the belief it can win.

Oshawa 3 Mississauga 2, overtime (Generals lead 2-0, Steelheads host Game 3 on Tuesday) — What was Oshawa's saving grace, other than being put on the power play in OT? The Gens sat captain Josh Brown with a minor injury, and found themselves surprisingly down 2-0 midway through the second period vs. the Steelheads, who responded well after being clocked 6-0 in the opener. Oshawa did have the depth to fall back on, though. While Michael Dal Colle was held to an assist, the second wave consisting of 18-year-old forwards Bradley Latour, Josh Sterk and Cole Cassels came through to score.

Cassels' winner 6:48 into free hockey came 14 seconds after Mississauga's Josh Burnside was penalized for interference after bowling over a General during a goalmouth scramble. It probably had to called, but given what was at stake, Steelheads coach-GM James Boyd could hardly be faulted for lingering on the bench to chat with the officials after his players went to the dressing room.

Sterk's tying goal 4:16 into the third also came on a power play after Mississauga was called for goalie interference. The goals spoiled an impassioned effort by the Steelheads, who were missing 19-year-old centre Bryson Cianfrone and forward Bobby MacIntyre, each of whom does his fair share of penalty killing.

What is the chance of Brown returning for Game 2? Generals coach D.J. Smith said there is a "good possibility" the 6-foot-4, 215-pound Florida Panthers selection will play. Granted, it's playoffs, everything is tentative.

Neate Sager is a writer for Yahoo! Canada Sports. Follow him on Twitter @neatebuzzthenet (video: TV Cogeco Ontario).