One has to ask if the “new look” Vancouver Giants are heading to round two with only one victory away from a berth to Round 2 of the WHL Playoffs.
The Royals were hoping for strong support on home ice to overtake the visiting Vancouver Giants, but this night they came up somewhat shy as they managed to defeat the Royals 5-3 in front of 6,792 fans.
Leading the “G” men was Bowen Byram with two goals while Davis Koch, Jared Dmytriw and James Malm each added singles, while David Tendeck stopped 26 of the 29 shots he faced.
Vancouver’s PK was five-for-six allowing the Giants to earn their second road victory of the series, while Matthew Phillips managed a goal and two assists for the Royals.
Overall Vancouver’s PK has been busy in the series as well as the first period of Saturday’s game that saw Victoria earn four straight PP opportunities in the opening period only to be denied by the Giants.
Giant’s Davis Koch put the “G-men” up 1-0 as he slipped in the slot, getting set up from Benson managing to collect his second goal of the series.
Shots after one were 10-8 Victoria but the Giants led 1-0.
The middle period (7:28) saw the Giants extended their lead to 2-0 when rookie Bowen Byram ripped home his second of the series with Dawson Holt doing the dirty work along the left side centering a pass to the Byram, who managed to slide into the area.
From this point the Western Conference Rookie of the Year nominee sent a one-timer past Royals starter Griffen Outhouse and believe it or not – he wasn’t finished YET!
Less than a minute later, Byram struck again and this time he moved into the slot, taking a feed from Ranger’s Ronning and hammered a shot past Outhouse on the glove side making it 3-0 Giants men.
Jared Dmytriw made it 4-0 for Vancouver at the 9:56 mark as he deflected a Kaleb Bulych point-shot for his second of the series and while it might be hard to believe the Giants scored three goals in a span of two minutes and 28 seconds.
Victoria managed to get one back a short 26 seconds later with their first of the night as Matthew Phillips skated past the Giants defense getting one on one with David Tendeck and sent a backhand deke past the Giants netminder for his second of the series.
The remainder of the period was scoreless as the Giants led 4-1 after two periods, out shooting Victoria 13-6 in the middle period alone.
The Royals leaned not only on their fans but also on Matthew Phillips, Dante Hannoun and Noah Gregor with all three 19-year-olds combined on a goal at 7:21 when Noah Gregor finished off a Matthew Phillips pass for his third of the series.
A short 1:22 later though the Giants got the game’s eventual insurance goal with Malm racing wide on the right-wing and tried to back-hand a pass across the ice to Ty Ronning only to have the puck bounce off the Royals D-man back to Malm who easily finished the play for his second of the series and a 5-2 Giants lead.
Former Greater Vancouver Canadian Dante Hannoun notched one at 11:41 on a PP moving the Royals within two, but that’s as close as they got.
David Tendeck managed a save off Jeff de Wit in the final minutes and for the remaining part of the third several Giants players blocked several shots turning aside any thought of goals by the Royals.
Final shots in the contest were 31-29 for the Giants who also went 0-1 on their lone PP opportunity while the Royals were 1-6 on the night.
The Giants return home for game 6 of the series Easter Monday (April 2nd) with the face-off set for 2:00 PM.
Should the Giants pull off a win that would confirm a WHL second-round series with the Tri-City Americans, but if not they would see game 7 in Victoria Tuesday night at 7:05 PM.
