A couple of big wins

Our first game last night was between the Aurora and Tigers, and with his girlfriend timekeeping, Noah Joncas once again came to play.  

With the teams playing 4 on 4, the Aurora's Brandon Crowell took his time and space and skated the puck up the ice.  He made chipped a pass over to linemate Matt Simpson who spotted Joncas wide open.  Noah took advantage of the nice pass and one timed the puck past Nick Comeau.  Despite the Aurora having the puck for most of the period, that goal at 7:36 was the only one of the first period.

The second period would be another story however, though it did take nearly 5 minutes to see another marker.  This time it was... the exact same scoring play, Joncas from Simpson and Crowell, with Noah once again scoring with a clapper.  The next goal was a bit of a weird one, as Max Dewey, unable to score on goal,den opportunities, threw a puck to the net from near the goal line.  The puck went of Comeau's shoulder, bounced up in the air and landed behind the goaltender, just barely rolling over the line.  

The 3-0 lead would last for 6 minutes when Derek Hale looked off Matt Simpson and demonstrated the bar down technique with a beauty of a shot.  Comeau wasn't going to be resting too much as he got left to face Simpson on a breakaway.  His shot went five hole and Comeau got most of it, but for the second time in the game, the puck just barely squeaked over the line.  Brandon Crowell would cap the Aurora scoring a minute later with a point shot through a screen.

Logan MacLean was playing well at the other end, but as he was eyeing his first shutout in the league, his defencemen let him down as Matt MacNeil took a feed from Allan Beaton and buried it with just 19 seconds left as the Aurora won 6-1, but failed to help Logan get the shutout.  David Lacey was quoted as saying "we couldn't let Logan get a big head out here with a shutout tonight" as his teammates said "yeah, you're the only one allowed to have a big head in our room".

On rink C we had the Evergreens playing the Greyhounds.  An Evergreens win would have them back in first place as the Osprey's Monday night win had them in the lead, at least for now.  The Greyhounds were just hoping to put an end to their 4 game losing streak.

The first period was probably the fastest period in leage history.  With periods being 17 minutes. We probably completed it in 18.5 minutes.  The first whistle of the game came at exactly 12:15.  We can tell you that because that was when Landon Miron, covering the point, fired a wrister on goal and beat Trevor Pate to make it 1-0 for the Evergreens.  It was the only goal of the period as the Evergreens failed to score on the only power play of the first, which, when called, was one of only 4 whistles blown in the period.  There could have been another at the 9 minute mark but Jonny Prall made a beauty of a save on Michael Lawless.

Much like over on rink B, the second period would be different than the first.  Less than a minute in, Brock Bethune rushed the puck up the right wing, beating everyone, and as he cut in towards the net, he shot a backhander that beat Pate's glove for the 2-0 lead.

Carter Nickerson was in the right place at the right time as Trevor Pate scrambled to make a rebound save and then, seeing the puck in front of him within reach, he lunged with his glove to grab the puck, but Nickerson was there and chipped it up and over the goalie for the 3-0 lead.  The Greyhounds were being outshot, and it just wasn't going to be their night.

That was until Captain Dylan MacDonald went to the net on a point shot and after Prall made a pad save, Dylan pulled the puck back and then under the pad of Prall as he stretched to save it.  Not only was the goal a shutout breaker and team motivator, the goal, Dylan's second of the year, won him a bet with Tigers captain Norm Gallant.  Dylan is the proud winner of a bag of Sour Patch Kids.

Dylan then proceeded to take a penalty just 40 seconds later.  As the timekeeper said "nice goal", he responded with "S.P.K.!!!".

From the penalty box, Dylan watched his team kill off the penalty and then Derick Levesque put the turbos on and took the free ice available going all the way to the Evergreens goal.  One on one with Prall, he went to the backhand and roofed that puppy to bring the Greyhounds within 1.  Then just 11 seconds after Dylan was freed from jail, Andrew MacDonald stole a puck and found himself with so much time he almost let up as if he thought he was offside or something.  Then he accelerated and fired a shot that Prall stopped, but Andrew didn't stop and he buried his rebound to tie the game up. In just under 3 minutes, the Greyhounds had turned the game around.

The shots after the first were just 11-7 in favour of the Evergreens, but the totals were climbing fast in the second.

At 4:40, Derick Levesque, again alone, got the Greyhounds their first lead of the game, and just 15 seconds later it was Michael Lawless taking a pass from Scott Stewart and ripping it off the crossbar and in to make it 5-3, but we aren't done yet.

Jeff Miles, while attempting to clear the puck from his zone, instead took a tripping penalty that sent the Evergreens to the power play, and less than a minute in, James Harrison took a Landon Miron pass and fired it through some legs and past Pate to make it 5-4 with a lot of time left.  Jonny Prall was called to the bench and the Evergreens put everything they had to the Greyhounds goal.  They got close on three occasions, but they couldn't come back, and they couldn't retake the league lead.  Landon Miron's 1G 2A were good enough to keep him atop the leaderboard for points and goals, and he's just 2 assists back of leading that category as well.