Vancouver Canucks defensive prospect Kirill Kudryavtsev played a massive role on Monday night, helping his OHL team, the Soo Greyhounds, take a commanding 3-0 series lead over another Canucks prospect, Vilmer Alriksson.
On Monday night, with the Greyhounds down 4-2 late in the second period, Kirill Kudryavtsev took charge. The 20-year-old blueliner had a beautiful spin-o-rama assist to Gavin Hayes who cut the Guelph Storm's lead to just one goal.
Flash forward to late in the third period, with the Greyhounds still down by one, Kudryavtsev skated down the open side after getting the puck at the Storm blueline and fired the puck past Guelph goaltender Brayden Gillespie to tie the game at 4-4, forcing overtime.
In the extra frame, Owen Allard, who played for Canada at the 2024 IIHF World Junior Hockey Championship, picked up the overtime winner just under a minute in to give the Greyhounds a stranglehold on the series and are now up 3-0 over Guelph.
While he didn't match the regular season point total he set last year, Kudryavtsev still had a solid campaign with the Greyhounds. In 67 games, he had 47 points (five goals, 42 assists), 18 penalty minutes and was a plus-29.