Another slow start plagued the Vancouver Giants on Saturday night, March 2, in a 3-2 loss to the Kamloops Blazers.
Goaltender Matthew Hutchison was fabulous for the Giants with 44 saves, but Vancouver was unable to generate much offence until the third period, trailing the game 3-1 and getting out-shot 34-10 after 40 minutes. They did get one goal back in the final 20 minutes, but that was as close as they would come.
Giants Associate Coach Adam Maglio said the team “didn’t have our legs, we didn’t have our jump early on.”
“Our game on the walls in those tough areas wasn’t up to par,” Maglio commented.
“We just started to skate [in the third]. I thought we were skating a little bit better, but our wall work coming out of our own end, our wall work down low in the first two periods, that’s where they dominated the game early on and that’s how they created their chances. They were a hungry team tonight.”
Sam Honzek (9th) and London Hoilett (9th) scored for the Giants.
Kamloops played a very strong first period, out-shooting the Giants 18-7.
They also got the game’s first goal, finding the back of the net four minutes in off the rush on the power play.
Vancouver responded with a power play goal of their own at the 10:05 mark of the first period, after Connor Levis launched a pass from the right boards to Honzek, who was heading to the net and had it deflect off him and go in to tie the game 1-1.
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In the second period, two Blazer defencemen found the back of the net.
Vancouver pushed back in the third, getting to within a goal at the 7:08 mark, after Hoilett was in the right place at the right time, tapping the puck in from the crease after Wyatt Wilson held the zone and fired a quick point shot to the net.
The Giants would pulled their goalie with just under three minutes remaining but rookie Kamloops goaltender Jesse Sanche turned away several chances to help hold off the Giants late push and get the win.
Hutchison was named third star of the game.
The defeat drops the Giants’ overall record to 28-27-4-0 (60 points), tied with the Kelowna Rockets for sixth place in the Western Conference standings.
Next, Giants finish their 3-in-3 Sunday with a matinee at the LEC against Seattle at 4 p.m.
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