EDMONTON – The Thunderbirds (7-0-2) got a taste of a potential first-round playoff matchup in Alberta, and performed well in the face of it with a powerful first half and a 3-0 road win over the Golden Bears (4-3-1).
Luke Norman was the offensive star of the day with two goals and an assist, setting up Max Comsia on the opener which continued the forward's streak of recording at least one goal contribution across each weekend of the season so far.
That first goal came just shy of the 10-minute mark, when Norman took advantage of the ball bobbling around in the attacking third by firing a sweet backheel pass to Comsia, who received the pass, turned and fired it into the goal from the edge of the penalty box. That marked his seventh goal of the year already, at least temporarily breaking the tie with Calgary's Luis Rangel-Kataev for the Canada West lead (pending the Dinos' Sunday night matchup with the Trinity Western Spartans).
The T-Birds racked up another five shot attempts over the next 30 or so minutes, but it appeared that the two teams were going to head into the halftime break with the score at 1-0. That is, until the visitors won a corner just as the fourth official signalled for two minutes of added time.
Seeking to catch their opponents off-guard, Nicolas Nadeau quickly took the corner short to Henri Godbout, who played it back to Nadeau near the corner of the penalty box. The Winnipeg native then whipped in a cross that found Norman, the result of which was a thunderous header that flew past Trystan Reid and into the Alberta net.
The 'Birds weren't done there, as just 30 seconds after the restart Norman launched a ball over the top of the defence for Comsia to run onto. After collecting the ball, Comsia picked his head up, played it across the top of the box to Markus Rukavina, who then laid it off to Norman. His shot took a massive deflection off an Alberta defender, causing it to loop up into the air and past the outstretched arms of Reid for a third UBC goal.
The Thunderbirds were able to lock things down defensively from there, as though the Golden Bears were able to get some offensive forays forward in the second half, they never were able to test
Jack Garner in the UBC goal.
The victory maintains the T-Birds' lead in the Pacific Division standings, now with just a month to go before the postseason. They return home next weekend, and will face another pair of prairie foes in MacEwan and Calgary on the Friday and Saturday of October 2 and 3.
With the Dinos currently sitting first in their own division, that matchup will provide another strong test for the Thunderbirds as they enter the stretch run.
