Vancouver, BC - The UBC Thunderbirds women's hockey team is headed to Regina this weekend and will attempt to assert themselves as one of the top teams in the Canada West conference.
Regina has won four straight games to climb to second in the conference with a 10-4-0 record, while UBC sits in fourth place at 7-4-3. The conference is unexpectedly tight from top to bottom, with only 10 points separating first from sixth.
It's a situation that makes every game critical, even at this early juncture of the season. That reality is not lost on head coach
Graham Thomas and his team.
“It's a huge weekend,” said Thomas. “We're going to go after them and we're ready to battle. It's a big weekend. We're excited to finish off the term with a strong effort.”
The Thunderbirds will be running into a hot Regina outfit that topped highly-touted Alberta twice a few weeks back, a team UBC split a pair with this past weekend. Regina is known as a highly offensive team, led by three of the top-10 scorers in the conference in Rianne Wight, Paige Wheeler and Stephanie Sawchuk. They also have a strong goaltending duo in Toni Ross and Jennifer Schmidt, who together have the conference's third best goals against average.
If UBC is going to take points on the road this weekend, they'll need to play like they did against Alberta this past Friday, when they asserted their style of play rather than letting the opponent dictate the terms. UBC utilizes aggressive break-outs and an up-tempo style, a style Regina will probably be comfortable playing.
“They play very similar to us,” Thomas explained. “They're going to compete hard, they've got strong goaltending like us, and we'll have to be opportunistic.”
UBC is led in net by
Danielle Dube (Vancouver, BC), who has the conference's second best save percentage and who has helped mentor
Samantha Langford (Pense, SK) to a very strong showing in her four appearances, too. Up front, UBC is led by the leading goal scorer in Canada West,
Rebecca Unrau (Humboldt, SK) who has eight goals on the season.
This is a UBC team that may be shorthanded for the trip, with several players banged up and potentially unavailable. It means the coming Christmas break will be a welcome reprieve in the schedule, but in the meantime it provides an opportunity for growth and depth development for the rest of the team.
“The team won't give up,” said Thomas. “In the meantime, it's an opportunity for other players to step up and step into certain roles. We're ready for this adversity.”
This will be the second and final weekend series of the season between the Thunderbirds and Cougars. UBC took three of a possible four points off Regina back in the opening weekend of the season, winning 4-0 and losing 3-2 in a shootout at the Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre on October 5-6.
The puck drops at 5:00 pm (PT) Friday and Saturday night in Regina.
