Vancouver, BC - The UBC Thunderbirds men's hockey team ran their winning streak to four games with a 2-1 double overtime victory over the Manitoba Bisons Saturday night at the Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre.
Scott Wasden (West Kelowna, BC) scored the game winner with 1:37 remaining in double overtime.
"I was very fortunate on the goal,
Nate Fleming took a nice shot and I had a wide open net, so all I had to do was tap it in," said
Scott Wasden. "This weekend taking on Manitoba, we wanted to make a statement and show the league we are a team to reckoned with and that we plan on making some noise in the playoffs and going far."
BOX SCORE
Just like on Friday night, the Manitoba Bisons set the early pace Saturday evening, using their speed to try and keep UBC on their heels. The Thunderbirds were able to weather storm and eventually got the best chance of the first 10 minutes of action, as
Wyatt Hamilton (Cochrane, AB) was denied on a 2-on-1; however, he did manage to draw a penalty. On the ensuing power play
Joe Antilla's (Madeira Park, BC) shot from the high slot was kicked aside by Joe Caligiuri. That was UBC's best chance on the man advantage. The Bisons would open the scoring just under 13 minutes into the opening period, as Dylan Kelly banged in a rebound off an Eric Mestery shot for his first goal of the season, beating
Jordan White (Surrey, BC) giving the visitors a 1-0 lead. UBC would answer before the period was out as
Max Grassi (North Vancouver, BC) took a feed from
Linden Saip (White Rock, BC) at centre ice, at full speed and weaved through the Bisons defense before snapping home his fifth goal of the season with only 15.9 seconds left in the period. 1-1 is how things would stand through 20 minutes of play. Shots were 9-7 in favour of UBC.
MHK: T-Birds v. Bisons (Nov. 17, 2012) Gallery
The second period of play resulted in neither team finding the back of the net. Both the 'Birds and Bisons had their opportunities. Antilla had a couple of chances in close, as did
Brad Hoban (Victoria, BC) on the power play. However, the best chance for UBC came off the stick of
Jessi Hilton (Sherwood Park, BC) who burst down the right wing and rifled a shot that Caligiuri was able to handle. At the other end,
Jordan White making his third straight start, handled everything thrown his way including a tough tip from the reigning Canada West Player of the Year Blair Macaulay and a hard slapper from Brandon Lockerby with 11.8 seconds left in the frame. Shots were 8-8 in the second period, as the scored remained 1-1.
Jordan White continued to show his worth in the third period, making big stops off Tyler Dittmer and Blair Macaulay. Joe Caligiuri did his part in the opposing net, stopping all 11 shots the Thunderbirds fired his way, the toughest on
Dillon Wagner (Keephills, AB) in close as he got a couple of whacks at the puck. However, after 60 minutes the game reamined tied at 1-1. Shots were 28-26 through regulation.
The Thunderbirds had a chance to end it all in the first overtime, but
Nate Fleming (St. Albert, AB) was stopped on a breakaway and then
Ben Schmidt (Campbell River, BC) had his stick lifted just at the last second as he was about to pounce on the rebound for a sure goal. Five minutes of 4-on-4 solved nothing, so it went to another five minutes of overtime, this time of 3-on-3 play and UBC would get the winner as
Scott Wasden banged in his team leading eighth goal of the year to give the Thunderbirds a 2-1 victory.
"The line of Fleming, Hamilton, and Cole WIlson did a great job of shutting down their top scorers, I don't think they got more then one goal in two games and that was definitely a huge key to the weekend sweep," said Wasden. "As for us we have been getting scoring from everybody which is a big key moving forward."
With the victory UBC extends their winning streak to four games and improves to 8-3-1 on the season, good for third spot in the conference, just one point back of second place Saskatchewan.
Final shots were 35-33 for UBC. White made 32 saves on the night. Neither team was able to capitalize on the power play as UBC went 0-for-3 and Manitoba finished 0-2.
"
Jordan White was solid again tonight. We had a couple of huge penalty kills were he stood on his head and kept us in the game," said Wasden.
Next up the Thunderbirds will make the trip to Edmonton to take on the Alberta Golden Bears Friday November 23 and Saturday November 24. Alberta currently sits atop the Canada West standings with 22 points.
"Alberta is ahead of us right, so we need to beat them to make up so points," said Wasden. "They are a team we will need to beat if we want to be true contenders in this conference, so it will be a good test."
