Despite being cheered on by thousands of local students, the Sarnia Sting fell to the Saginaw Spirit 3-2 on Tuesday.
The Sting held their first "School Day" game at Progressive Auto Sales Arena, with approximately 3,671 students in attendance. It was the lone OHL game on the schedule for November 7.
Saginaw carried an early lead into the second period.
However, Marko Sikic put Sarnia on the board in the second with assists from Tyson Doucette and Andrew LeBlanc.
Sarnia's Zach Filak tied the game with help from Easton Wainwright and Lukas Fischer.
In the end, Saginaw skated away with a game-winning goal in the third.
Sting goalie Nick Surzycia stopped 29 of the 32 shots on net.
During a post-game press conference, Cooper Way said it was a different experience to be at the rink at 11 a.m.
"We were good to go and the atmosphere [was] amazing. It's really loud, lots of fun, and they had a lot of energy and we tried to use that," Way said.
Despite the loss, Way said the team played well.
"It just comes down to a couple of bounces against a good team like Saginaw," he said. "They had a couple extra bounces than we did and we had a couple harder plays and that's unfortunately what it comes down to."
The Sarnia Sting are back on the ice Thursday at Peterborough as part of a three-game road trip. They'll also play at Kingston on Friday and Ottawa on Sunday.
"It's a good opportunity for us to grow as a team. We're going to go up against three good teams, three quality teams in the Eastern Conference and that's really going to test us on the ice. But off the ice, it's a lot of quality time we spend together," said Way. "Especially as a young team, it's going to be important for us to kind of band together and stick together."
The games can be heard live on 103.9FM/1070AM CHOK. Puck drop on Thursday is set for 7:05 p.m.