After losing their first three games of the season by a single goal each, the Queen’s men’s hockey team continued their campaign at home this weekend with two more close contests, falling 5-3 to the Guelph Gryphons on Friday and squeaking out a 3-2 overtime win against the Laurier Golden Hawks on Saturday.
The Gaels had plenty of support for the home opener against Guelph on Friday night, as a reported 1,473 fans turned out filling Jock Harty and creating an atmosphere that has been notably absent from Gaels’ hockey games recently. However, the crowd became subdued when Guelph jumped out to an early 2-0 lead.
Queen’s appeared to cut the lead later, but the goal was disallowed despite the protests of Queen’s players.
With a little more than six minutes remaining in the first period and Queen’s on the power play, Neil Poulsen got the Gaels on the board when he redirected a Clinton McCullough point shot past Gryphons goaltender Ken Ritson. Captain Brad Walford had the second assist on the goal, giving him his first point of the season.
Before the first period was finished, however, Guelph re-established their two-goal lead when Matt Willoughby tapped in a rebound given up by Gaels goaltender Matt Kenney off a Thomas Laplante shot from a bad angle.
In the second period, things got worse for the Gaels as Guelph scored a goal that found goaltender Matt Kenney out of position, extending their lead to 4-1. The Gaels, however, responded well to their largest deficit of the season.
As Queen’s began to get frustrated, tempers flared, and penalties resulted. With 4:48 left in the second period, Queen’s was awarded a two-man advantage for 1:23, but was unable to capitalize. The momentum from the powerplay continued to favour Queen’s in the dying moments of the period, and with 55 seconds remaining, Jamie Brock scored a crucial goal to bring the Gaels back within two going into the break. Walford notched his second assist of the game on the goal.
There was no further scoring until late in the third period, when Andrew Gilbert solved Ritson one more time to bring Queen’s within one, eliciting an explosion of support from the crowd. Again, Walford had the lone assist, giving him three on the night.
Guelph put the game out of reach in the final minute with an empty-net goal as Queen’s could not score the equalizer. The loss dropped the Gaels to 0-4 on the season, having lost the games by a combined total of just five goals.
The team stepped back onto the ice the following evening against the 2-1-1 Golden Hawks and finally managed head coach Kirk Muller’s first win as a CIS coach.
Gaels assistant captain Jeff Ovens opened the scoring 8:41 into the first period, and Laurier tied the game with less than two minutes remaining. Three and a half minutes into the second, rookie Cliff Starke reestablished the lead, but Laurier responded again with a goal 7:28 into the third.
The game remained tied at the end of regulation time, setting up overtime and guaranteeing the Gaels their first point of the season. Brian Moore doubled that point total when he fired a rebound past Laurier goaltender Edward Van Herpt less than three minutes into the overtime period.
The win moved the Gaels into second place in their division behind RMC, with U of T and Ryerson still winless. The schedule doesn’t get any easier for Queen’s as they travel to Quebec to take on l’Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières and Concordia—both considered powerhouse teams—next weekend.
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