It was a big opening day for the Pacific Junior Hockey League at the Cyclone Taylor Cup provincial junior “B” championships in Ladner.
The PJHL champion Langley Trappers and host Delta Ice Hawks are both in the driver’s seat and it sets up an interesting day two of the tournament on Friday.
Langley can clinch a spot in Sunday’s gold medal game with a regulation win over Kootenay International Junior Hockey League champion Revelstoke Grizzlies at 3:30 p.m. The Ice Hawks can do the same when they hit the Ladner Leisure Centre ice at 7:30 p.m. to take on Vancouver Island champion Peninsula Panthers.
Here’s a recap of both teams’ wins on Thursday:
Delta 2
Revelstoke 0
A 23-day layoff for the host Ice Hawks was apparently needed to rest their penalty killers.
They were outstanding in snuffing out all nine Grizzlies’ power plays in front of the shutout goaltending of Braedy Euerby.
First period goals from Dominic Passalacqu-Main and Connor Merriman proved to be all the cushion the Ice Hawks would need.
Their penalty killing heroics included an extended two-man advantage in the third period while Cole Berg hit the goal post on a second period penalty shot.
Euerby earned player-of-the-game honours for the hosts while his counterpart Brandon Weare was equally brilliant and showed why he was named MVP of the KIJHL playoffs.
“Some great efforts on PK including Braedy who I thought made three or four big saves early that really set the tone that it wasn’t going to be easy to score on us,” said Ice Hawks GM and head coach Steve Robinson. “Would have been great to finish one or two more chances and ease thru the third but it probably did us some good to have a gritty, hard working game like that to get all the rust off.”
Langley 6
Peninsula 2
The Langley Trappers surrendered the first four shots of their Cyclone Taylor Cup opener against the Peninsula Panthers. By the time they caught up, they had a 3-0 lead and never looked back in a 6-2 victory.
Goals from Lleyton Shearon and Brendan O’Grady 77 seconds apart gave the Trappers a 2-0 lead and chased starting Panthers goalie Kelly Brady in the process.
That did little to slow the momentum as Jacob Astles beat Ashton Lukan 45 seconds later and the Vancouver Island champs were in a deep hole.
Austin Ungurean made it 4-0 before Peninsula finally got on the board on a power play maker from Payton Braun. However, Langley took a 5-1 lead into the first intermission on a tally from Jamie Hylands.
Peninsula dominated the second period with a 17-7 advantage in the shot department and cut the deficit to 5-2 on a late goal from Logan Speirs. O’Grady notched his second of the night in the third to seal the victory.
Caedon Bellmann was solid in net making 25 saves.
Brady returned between the pipes for the final 40 minutes and made 17 saves.
