After back-to-back victories against the Eastern Washington University Eagles — and their third and fourth straight victories — the SFU Men’s Hockey Team cruised to first place in the BCIHL standings.
SFU beat the Eagles 4-3 in a shootout after coming back from a 3-0 deficit Friday night, while Saturday they held off a comeback from the other side to win 6-4.
The back-to-back games provided the Clan a chance to show off some new talent: forwards Mak Barden, Mitch Crisanti, and defenceman Dyllan Quon played their first game Friday night, while forward Spencer Quon made his debut in Saturday’s game. The Quons and Crisanti were teammates on 2014/15 PJHL champions, the North Van Wolf Pack.
All four new players registered a point in Saturday’s game. Five of the nine goals scored in bothgames were by first year players.
On Friday night, Eastern Washington took the lead early, scoring five minutes into the game, and expanding that lead to 3-0 before the first period was done. As well, after the first period, SFU had only four defenceman after Jesse Williamson and Darnel St Pierre were given game misconducts after a brawl behind the net.
Despite the deficit in both manpower and score, SFU started to turn things around in the third period. Only 4-3 seconds into the third, on the power play, first year forward Brendan Lamont put SFU on the board with his third BCIHL goal from Mathew BerryLamontagna and Robson Cramer.
Cramer, a first year defenceman, would put the Clan within one, while second year forward Saylor Preston tied the game up with 9:27 left in the period.
Despite being outshot 22-12 in the first two periods, SFU dominated the third with 15 shots to Eastern Washington’s four.
With no more scoring in regulation and overtime, the game went to shootout. SFU’s first shooter Crisanti missed, but Berry-Lamontagna and Tyler Basham buried their opportunities winning the game.
Lyndon Stanwood saved 24 out of 27 shots, and made two out of three saves in the shootout.
While the Clan worked furiously Friday night to come back from a 3-0 deficit, Saturday night they were the ones who had to defend the lead.
Eastern Washington’s Beau Walker, coming off of a one game suspension, scored only 23 seconds into the game.
However, less than two minutes later, Lamont, once again on the power play, tied up the game from Jono Ceci, who did not play Friday night, and Cramer. Ceci would get another assist when exactly six minutes later Basham knocked it in to give SFU the 2-1 lead.
In the second, SFU took a dominant 5-1 lead with goals from Mike Sandor, Stephen Ryan, and Barden — Barden’s first BCIHL goal.
In the third, the Eagles nearly clawed their way back into the game, scoring three goals in aspan of five minutes to put the game within one at 5-4.
BerryLamontagna, however, killed the momentum with one last goal with 8:16 left in the game, to make the final score 6-4, with assists from Crisanti and Barden.
Jordan Liem made 33 saves on 37 shots.
This weekend, SFU will host the BCIHL Showcase which will see all BCIHL teams play at Bill Copeland Sports Centre from Friday to Sunday. The Clan will play Eastern Washington Friday at 7 and Selkirk College Saturday at 7. Tickets are $10 for adults and $5 for students, children, and seniors.