Regular Season Winds Down

As the snow finally eventually leaves the lower mainland and the arrival of spring, the hockey season for the Greater Vancouver Canadians is slowly coming to an end, but not before they start the playoffs.

The final weekend of play saw the Canadians enter the weekend with a pair of games on  the slate, but first it was a trip to Abbotsford for a Saturday afternoon match-up.

With three games separating the two teams it was essential for the Canadians to either win one or both of the games as they move forward into the 2017-18 BCMML playoffs.

Saturday’s game in the “valley” would see the Canadians pull away with a 7-4 win advancing up in the standings in hopes of a better playoff position.

The C’s Captain Scott Atkinson managed to notch three markers of his own with assists going to Araki-Young and Williams.

Other single markers came from Ghieuw, Landon, Hewson and Araki-Young with Lukas Shaw playing strong between the pipes allowing them to steal two points, with each team taking five penalties.

The Thunderbird’s were looking at rebounding pulling off two points of their own, but such was not going to be the case on home ice for the “C’s”.

The final home game of the season saw the Canadians start Lucas Shaw, while the Thunderbirds went with Chad Cromar in hopes of stealing two points away from the GVC.

The game started with a fast tempo played in both ends, would see both teams end up with a shoving match in the Canadian’s zone to the left of Shaw, where several penalties were assessed.

The C’s took the early lead at 13:10 of the  first with Mutala getting set up from Atkinson and Donohoe with a nifty “tip-in”.

Staying true to form it was Rybinski getting his first of the game at 6:31 from Mutala giving the C’s a 2-0 lead only to be followed by his second of the game at 5:20.

This goals had the helpers come from Noah Kelly and River Fahey and try as they might the T-Birds were unable to match the play of the C’s as the first came to an end with the C’s up by a 3-0 tally.

The second saw a “tender” change for the T-Birds as they put Bilous in to replace Cromar in hopes of getting some jump in their stride, which might have been to little too late.

As if not content with two goals, Mutala popped in his third of the game at 17:55 of the second on a solo effort which would be the eventual game winner.

It may have taken a while but at the 18:46 mark of the period the T-Birds saw Justin Plett get one past Shaw to get them within two with the only assist going to Anderson.

The second would end up with a 3-1 margin with at least at this point minimal penalties being assessed to either team.

The T-Birds managed to capitalize and get two additional goals with the first being at 15:09 as Stuart getting set up from Visram to pull within one.

Building on this saw the T-Birds Anderson get what would prove to be the final goal of the game at 5:08 with assists going to genberg and Rees who slipped one past Shaw to round out the scoring.

With the game coming to an abrupt conclusion and the ongoing frustrations from this game and the previous game it was too much of a shock to see both Minors and a Misconduct dished out at the games conclusion.

It may have taken a while but the officials eventually got things sorted out and the teams retired to the dressing rooms.

This scrum was followed by a discussion with the Coaching staff of either team with the referee which left some pondering what penalties, if any would be assessed, but we now know the C’s were tagged with five and the T-Birds were handed four.

Game first star on this night for the C’s alone was Henry Rybinski who single-handedly helped the C’s to victory.

The Canadians have next week as a by-week and await to see who they will face in the playoffs.

Stay tuned, we’ll keep you posted.

Thanks to everyone who “tuned-in” to listen to the  GVC broadcast throughout the season and we look forward to more exciting GVC hockey from the Richmond Oval.