The St. Louis Ambush fell 14-6 to the Ontario Fury Friday night at Axius Field at the Family Arena. The loss dropped the Ambush to 6-7 on the season, while Ontario improved to 5-1.
Ontario took a 2-0 lead within the first two minutes of the contest. Juan Carlos Gonzalez scored in the first minute, followed by Jorge Deleon, who nailed a long shot from just inside the yellow line. St. Charles native Justin Stinson scored for Ontario at 11:50 and Thiao Goncalves at 13:02 to give the visitors a 4-0 advantage at the end of the opening frame.
It was more of the same in the second quarter, with two goals from St. Charles native Justin Stinson and one from Maicon De Abreu for a 7-0 game. The Ambush finally got on the board with back-to-back goals within the ninth minute that, in each case, came off an Ambush player’s foot and found the back of the net courtesy of an Ontario player. The two Ambush tallies were credited to Tony Walls and Jerjer Gibson. Ambush defender Greg Kranz went on a long run with the ball, passed it to Howard Miller, Jr., who passed it back to Kranz, who got off a hard and accurate shot into the net to make it a 7-3 contest, a score that held until halftime.
Ontario went up 8-3 on Franck Tayou’s unassisted tally at 6:39 of the third period. The Ambush answered less than a minute later when Vadim Cojocov passed to William Eskay, who was able to get his shot passed Ontario goalkeeper Jesus Molina to make the score 8-4.
Ontario increased their lead to 9-4 when Ambush goalkeeper Paulo was out of the goal and couldn’t get back in time to stop a shot from Nestor Hernandez in the fifth minute of the fourth quarter. St. Louis went on a power play when Jesus Pacheco was sent to the penalty box for boarding and it was an opportunity they would make good on as Tony Walls scored at 5:32 to shave the deficit to 9-5. With Paulo once again out of the goal helping on offense, De Abreu got his second of the night on an empty-netter at 8:54. With the sixth attacker in play for the Ambush, Stefan Mijatovic made it 10-6 at 10:43. Ontario took advantage of St. Louis using a sixth attacker instead of a goalkeeper by scoring three times in less than two minutes. Ambush goalkeeper Paulo came back in goal, but it didn’t stop the onslaught as Gonzalez scored again with three second remaining on the clock for a 14-6 final.
Ontario outshot St. Louis 28-27 in the match. Molina made 11 saves on 17 chances (.647 Sv%) in goal for the Fury. Paulo made eight saves in 19 attempts (.421 Sv%) in goal for St. Louis.
The Ambush are back in action Sunday afternoon when they clash with the Tacoma Stars in a 3:05 p.m. matinee affair. After this weekend’s action, the Ambush will close out the regular season at home when the Dallas Sidekicks invade the Family Arena Friday, March 12 at 7:35 p.m. CST. Tickets for upcoming home games are available at the Family Arena box office or online at ticketmaster.com. All Ambush games can also be viewed online at Facebook Live PPV.
