By Aaron Bell
The Windsor Spitfires picked up in the playoiffs exactly where they left off in the regular season.
After putting together a franchise-best regular season and winning the Hamilton Spectator Trophy as the OHL's regular season champions, the Spitfires started the playoffs with a 7-4 win over the Owen Sound Attack in the first game of their Western Conference series on Wednesday.
Defencemen Ryan Ellis and Rob Kwiet had two goals each, including powerplay markers early in the first period, and Taylor Hall had a goal and two assists to pace the Spitfires' offence.
Greg Nemisz and Eric Wellwood also scored for the Spitfires, who built up a 5-0 lead by the midway point of the second period.
Joey Hishon, David Kolomatis, Mike Lomas and Joe Vanni scored for Owen Sound with Hishon and Garrett Wilson each picking up a pair of assists.
Andrew Engelage stopped 19 of 23 shots for the win while Tyler Beskorowany allowed five goals on 23 shots before giving way to Scott Stajcer, who allowed one goal on 30 shots.
Owen Sound hosts Game 2 on Friday.
Belleville Bulls 3, Sudbury Wolves 1
In Belleville, Matt Tipoff scored the go-ahead goal halfway through the third period to lead the Bulls to a 3-1 win over the Sudbury Wolves in the opening game of their Eastern Conference playoff series.
Akim Aliu opened the scoring for the Wolves in the second period before Nick Palmieri replied for Belleville less than 30 seconds later. Eric Tangradi iced the win with an empty net goal in the dying seconds of the game.
Mike Murphy was the game's first star after turning aside 25 shots while Andrew Loverock allowed two goals on 37 shots on the Wolves' net and was named second star.
Belleville hosts Game 2 on Thursday before the series shifts to Sudbury for three games beginning on Sunday.
