Griffins overwhelm Thunder with 62 shots in 6-1 win

Jefferson Hagen / MacEwan Athletics

EDMONTON – Wave after wave of pressure swamped the Concordia Thunder boat by the time the first period was done at the Downtown Community Arena.

The MacEwan University Griffins poured 24 shots on net in the opening frame alone as they gained a 3-0 lead after 20 minutes and cruised to a 6-1 beat-down of their cross-town ACAC men's hockey rivals on Saturday night.

"I think it was our most complete game of the year tonight," said Griffins head coach Bram Stephen. "It got a little sloppy late, but I liked our toughness to stay with it mentally for the full 60, especially after last night wasn't a close score.

"You see it a lot in our league where the other team will rebound and to have another night like that – that was really a good sign of confidence.

"We had some veterans get dinged up last night, so that was nice to see guys stepping up and playing in different spots," he added.

The Griffins, who also blasted Concordia 6-0 on Friday night, outshot their ACAC rivals 62-30 at the Downtown Community Arena on Saturday.

The most impressive thing is they never took their foot off the gas. There was no letdown that is so often seen amid the momentum swings of a hockey game.

"We've been preaching all year that no matter what happens there's going to be ebbs and flows throughout the game. We've got to stick to our game," said Griffins defenceman Taylor Bilyk, who was named player of the game for MacEwan. "We can't deviate from what we're doing.

"If we're taking it to a team, we can't stop. We've got to keep going with what's working."

Rookie defenceman Gabriel Bystrom opened the scoring for the Griffins at 8:02 of the first period when he took a pass from Bryan Arneson on a 2-on-1 and one-timed it past Concordia goalie Connor Dobberthien.

The floodgates opened after that as MacEwan defender Tyler Morrison walked in from the point, slipped a defender and wristed it to the far corner off the post and in at 2:50 before Cameron Gotaas made it 3-0 with 11 seconds left in the frame when he potted a rebound off a Matthew Waseylenko point shot.

Dallas Smith made it 4-0 at 15:07 of the second period when his second whack at a rebound beat Dobberthien off Daniel Wray's nice centering pass.

Smith scored again at 7:27 of the third when he located the puck in a scramble and hit an open net. Gotaas also netted his second of the game when he came flying down the left wing at 3:51 and snapped a shot that hit Dobberthien's glove and bounced up and over him into the net.

Concordia's Phil Dillon, who played a strong game throughout, broke Chris Wray's shutout bid with just 4:17 left when he wired a wrister that slipped between the goalie's arm and body blocker side.

Tempers immediately flared with a post-goal scrum and the game reached its most heated point shortly thereafter when Concordia captain Colin Minardi speared Bystrom right in front of the MacEwan bench and was tossed on a five-minute match penalty.

Minardi undoubtedly had a bee in his bonnet after getting blown up by Bilyk a couple of minutes prior to that on what appeared to be a clear-cut breakaway down the left side before the defenceman sped in, knocked the puck off his stick and deposited him hard into the end boards.

"I just wanted to get my stick on the puck," said Bilyk. "I wasn't even really thinking of hitting him. I didn't get a lot of him, but I got enough of him to knock him over."

Chris Wray made 29 saves for the win, while Dobberthien stopped 56 in the defeat.

With the weekend wins, the Griffins improve to 13-4-1 in the ACAC standings, but they didn't gain any ground. Both NAIT and SAIT won twice, as well, and the top of the table remains as tight as ever; SAIT leads by three points, while MacEwan is still up by one on NAIT for second, but the Ooks have two games in hand.

"It's going to be like this down the stretch," said Stephen. "We've got to win the games we think we should win. It will be fun playing those teams that are around us in the standings in a couple of weeks."

Concordia falls to 4-14 on the campaign, tied with Portage for the final playoff spot, but the Voyageurs have three games in hand.

MacEwan next hosts Briercrest (2-13-3) Friday (7 p.m.) and Saturday (1 p.m.) at the Downtown Community Arena.