VANCOUVER – Kicking off a home-and-home series with the Trinity Western Spartans (0-2) Friday night in Langley, the UBC Thunderbirds (1-1) head into week two of the Canada West season looking for results, but also consistency, following a rollercoaster opening weekend.

Closing out the home-and-home Saturday afternoon at Father Bauer Arena, the T-Birds head into an early season bye week before a gauntlet of a November schedule – all the more reason to get a couple more in the win column against a divisional opponent.

"We need to have a weekend here because I don't want to go into a bye week .500 with that schedule," said UBC head coach, Sven Butenschon, whose team settled for a weekend split with the Bisons to open up the new campaign. "We need to improve in a lot of areas, I would say consistency is still an issue with us. In the pre-season we had a couple of so-so games, figured some stuff out, put together four really solid, smart hockey games and then over the weekend against Manitoba, some of those issues kind of came back into our game. (This weekend) is going to be another tough matchup. We played them in pre-season, they beat us in pre-season, so they're going to be confident and we got to figure stuff out here pretty quick."



UBC's first exhibition game back on September 11 saw the Spartans earn their first ever Canada West victory against the 'Birds in 40 tries. The T-Birds remain undefeated vs TWU in games that count, but face a hungry Trinity team determined to make more history against the 'Birds in their home opener Friday night.

"They're kind of top heavy," said Butenschon of the Spartans lineup. "They've got this one line with a couple Ukrainian kids and Christian Lowe, their captain. They have a couple nice defencemen and a great goaltender, and then a bunch of hard working guys that play a two-way game. We got to be able to shut their high end guys down and I think we'll be fine if we can do that."

One of those Ukrainian forwards, Mikahilo Simchuk, managed a three-point weekend to open the season in Regina. While the Spartans combined for seven goals, they still dropped both games to the Cougars.



The T-Birds are coming off a 3-0 shutout victory over Manitoba Saturday, but combined with Friday night's season opening loss and some persistent deficiencies in their own zone, positive results aren't the only thing the team is looking for against the Spartans.

"We got to go back to the way we played in the pre-season. Structurally for the most part it's been pretty good, but we're making one or two really dumb mistakes by individuals, and that's everybody. Until we correct that I think it's going to be a challenge."



"I might have focussed too much on Manitoba last week. Usually, our mindset is always about our guys, our group, what are we doing while letting the other team do whatever they want. If we're dialled, we're going to be successful, so we got to get back to that mindset – not just the players, but also myself."

Puck drop Friday night at the Langley Events Centre is set for 7:00 p.m. with Saturday's rematch getting underway at 3:00 p.m. at Father Bauer Arena. Tickets for Saturday are available online or at the door while both games will be streamed live on Canada West TV.