VANCOUVER – Just as they did in last year's playoff series, the MacEwan Griffins drew first blood, handing the UBC Thunderbirds a 4-2 defeat Friday night at the Doug Mitchell Thunderbird Sports Centre, spoiling the blue and gold's home opener party in front of nearly 2000 fans.
The Griffins (1-0) stunned the T-Birds by scoring twice within a 33 second span early in the first period, capitalizing on a couple defensive breakdowns.
UBC managed to tie the game early in the third period with
Ty Thorpe's first of the campaign on the power play, the 'Birds seemingly with momentum fully on their side following a dominant middle frame.
But Kadyn Chabot restored the Griffins' lead 9:01 into the final period, converting on a late breakaway. Vincent Scott iced the game with his second of the night, sliding the puck into the empty net as the visitors scored four times on just 14 shots to earn their first regular season win in Vancouver.
"You got to give them credit for capitalizing on a couple gifts we gave them," said UBC head coach,
Sven Butenschon, after his squad dropped their second straight home opener. "Maybe our focus wasn't there right off the puck drop and sure enough a couple mistakes and we're down. They'd have five guys back in the neutral zone, they were great at blocking shots and digging in on defence and had great goaltending. So it was just really tough chasing that game. The ice conditions weren't great so the execution around the net wasn't great. But no excuse, you can't lose hockey games like that."
Much like they were to start last year's playoff series, the Griffins were faster and more physical out of the gate Friday night.
Dwayne Jean Jr opened scoring just 5:03 in on MacEwan's first shot on net, capping off a quick transition up ice off a defensive zone faceoff.
Scott's first of the season doubled MacEwan's lead just 33 seconds later, quieting the robust crowd.
The T-Birds found themselves to start the second, putting together a dominant 20 minutes that saw them outshoot the Griffins 12-4.
Nathan Sullivan scored UBC's first goal of the season in his first game as a Thunderbird, finishing backdoor off a feed from Thorpe.
Sullivan returned the favour just 1:48 into the third while on the power play, dancing around a Griffin defenceman, dishing to Thorpe who wristed the puck over Carson Ironside's glove, tying the game 2-2.
But another defensive breakdown by the T-Birds led to Chabot's game winning tally which, similar to the Griffins' first goal of the game, came off a quick up-ice transition from a d-zone draw.
Despite outshooting MacEwan 29-14 and out-chancing them by a similar margin, the T-Birds weren't able to find their offensive mojo.
"Early on we'd been trying to send that message, let's just be really simple to start, not just because it's the first game of the year and the ice is bad but also we've had a lot of injuries throughout training camp," said Butenschon. "I've mixed the lines up way too much in my opinion just trying to find a recipe for success and chemistry with certain lines."
The 'Birds will get another crack at the Griffins Saturday when the division rivals shift over to Father Bauer Arena.
"Normally the game's really fast up there, the ice is a lot better, it's physical, the game's really intense and fast. That's the way we want to play. It's not going to be easy, we can talk all we want and we can strategize all we want, but they're doing the same thing. They're so organized defensively and they rely on their goalie to make that first save. They got some defencemen that come to the rink and are totally okay with playing defence for 60 minutes."
Puck drop Saturday is set for 3:00 p.m.
Tickets are available online and the game will be streamed live on
Canada West TV.
