VANCOUVER – The UBC Thunderbirds used a four-goal second period to record a 6-1 victory over the visiting Regina Cougars in Canada West men's hockey action on Saturday night at the Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre.
 
Nick Buonassisi (Coquitlam, B.C.) scored twice for the 10th-ranked T-Birds, who improved to 6-0-2 to begin Canada West play in 2015-16. Luke Lockhart (Burnaby, B.C.), David Robinson (Vernon, B.C.), Kyle Becker (Langley, B.C.) and Austin Vetterl (Surrey, B.C.) also found the net for UBC.
 
Cody Fowlie was the lone goal scorer for the visiting Cougars, who dropped to 1-7-0.
 
The second period was a busy one with five penalties and five goals.
 
Already ahead 1-0 on Buonassisi's opening marker in the first, the Thunderbirds doubled their lead at 6:52 of the second when a charging Lockhart tipped home a Joe Antilla (Madeira Park, B.C.) pass from the left boards at the bottom of the faceoff circle.
 
At 15:12, Robinson scored on a 2-on-1, as he kept the puck and wired it into the top right corner.
 
Following his high-sticking minor, rookie defenceman Becker flew out of the box and received a pass from Brandon Underwood (Carlsbad, Calif.) at the Regina blue line, broke in and backhanded a shot past Regina goaltender Andy Desautels.
 
But right off the ensuing faceoff just nine seconds later, Fowlie got credit on a strange goal. He got a turnover inside the UBC zone and shot the puck towards the net.
 
UBC goaltender Eric Williams (Langley, B.C.) described what happened next.
 
"[the puck] went over the net, hit the glass, came back—I was going to catch it. It bounced off the top of the cross bar over my glove and landed right on a guy's stick. I tried to spin around and get a pad on it."
 
Fowlie, standing in front of the net, tapped the puck in for a goal. He was deemed to have scored by the officials after a short deliberation.
 
Then just before the second intermission, Buonassisi got his second goal of the game, scoring from the left faceoff circle high stick side on a 1-on-1 play.
 
On the final goal at 9:24 of the third, Antilla got possession of a rebound off Desaultels, who stopped the original point shot. Instead of trying to go for goal from in close on the left side, he passed across the front of the goal to a wide-open Vetterl on the right side. The rookie made the easy tap-in for the power play tally.
 
The Cougars were 0 for 6 on the power play tonight while the Thunderbirds were 1 for 7, and were also outshot 35-28. Williams made 34 saves, while Desaultels had 22.
 
"I just want to help out the team," Williams said. "I'm not the biggest guy so I like to be aggressive, cutting down angles and just trying to make their shooters beat me on a good shot and not give them the easy top corner."
 
Also of note on Saturday was UBC defenceman Neil Manning (Nanaimo, B.C.), who was a plus-5 on the night.
 
The Cougars are in Calgary next weekend to take on the Dinos for a pair of games, while the 'Birds will also travel to southern Alberta, for Saturday-Sunday doubleheader in Lethbridge, Alta.