Saints keep on winning, sweep TRU WolfPack in weekend series
By The Nelson Daily Sports
Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing for the Selkirk Saints Men’s Hockey Club.
The Saints made is a clean sweep — its fourth consecutive win to start the B.C. Intercollegiate Hockey League — by posting a two-game sweep of the Thompson Rivers University WolfPack at the Castlegar Recreation Complex.
The Saints opened with an 8-2 shellacking Friday before dumping the WolfPack 5-1 Saturday.
“”We had some defensive lapses on Friday night that we wanted to clean up, and we were much stronger in our own zone on Saturday,” said Saints head coach Jeff Dubois.
“Offensively things are rolling pretty well and all four lines are contributing. Connor (McLaughlin) has been very hard to stop, and his line with Scott (Swiston) and Beau (Taylor) has done an outstanding job playing against the other team’s top line.”
Connor McLaughlin once again led the way offensively for the Saints, scoring the game’s opening goal four minutes into regulation as well as the 3-0 tally early in the second period.
Sandwiched between those markers was Darnell Dyck’s first BCIHL goal off a nifty Logan Proulx feed late in the first.
Former Trail Smoke Eaters forward Tyler Berkholtz trimmed the Selkirk lead to 3-1, but the Saints shut down the WolfPack in the third and received insurance goals from Cody Fidgett and Logan Proulx to cap the scoring.
James Prigione picked up his second win in as many starts in goal for Selkirk, stopping 24 shots on the night. Chris Solecki took the loss for TRU but made a number of outstanding saves amongst his 39 stops.
Friday, Matt Luongo opened the scoring midway through the first period when he deflected a Mason Spear centering feed past TRU starter Stephen Wolff.
The goal marked Luongo’s first goal as a Saint. Spear then doubled the lead in the closing minutes of the period when he jumped on a turnover deep in the TRU zone and converted with a five-hole shot.
The Saints then took control of the game in the second period courtesy of leading scorer Connor McLaughlin, who scored back-to-back goals on fine individual efforts.
First, he took a pass from linemate Scott Swiston and undressed a TRU defender before scoring on a nifty backhand deke.
Minutes later he broke through the neutral zone, deked a pair of defencemen and beat Wolff with a snapshot from the top of the circle.
Selkirk would strike three more times in the span of 2:16 to put the game out of reach, as a pair of Cody Fidgett power-play goals sandwiched a Jackson Garrett tally.
TRU would go on to score a pair in the third period but never came closer than six goals back of the Saints’ lead.
Aaron Oakley made 25 saves in his BCIHL regular season debut, while Wolff — who joined TRU this summer following a season with the Saints — allowed seven goals on 30 shots before giving way to Chris Solecki for the third period.
The Saints and WolfPack will meet again on Friday in Kamloops (8:30 p.m. Memorial Arena) before Selkirk travels to the Lower Mainland for its first regular season match-up against SFU.
Comments