OUA Men's Hockey Playoffs – First Round
Game One: UOIT defeated Concordia 4-0
Game Two: Sat. Feb. 17 @ Concordia (7:30 p.m.)
OSHAWA, Ont. – The UOIT men's hockey team managed to shut down the Concordia Stingers top-ranked offence as they picked up a 4-0 win on Wednesday night to take a 1-0 lead in their best-of-three OUA eastern conference quarter-final series.
The Ridgebacks will look to advance to the second round for the second straight year as the teams travel to Montreal for game two on Friday night at 7:30 p.m. If necessary, game three will take place on Saturday in Montreal. Both games will be streamed on OUA.tv.
"Tonight was a must-win," said UOIT head coach
Curtis Hodgins. "We didn't want to go there down a game. We'll continue to try and execute our game plan and look to put them on their heels in their home rink and see what we can do."
Brendan O'Neill (Ilderton, Ont.) recorded the first shutout in Ridgeback postseason history making 35 saves including 17 in the second period in the victory. This marks O'Neill's second straight shutout as he had a 26 save performance in a 2-0 victory over UQTR in their regular season finale.
"Neiller played well," said Hodgins. "That's two in a row for him. He played well and made the saves when he had to. I also thought the guys played well in front of him and as we executed our game plan tonight."
Mitch Bennett (Fenelon Falls, Ont.) put the Ridgebacks up 1-0 at 11:47 of the first period as the assistant captain batted the puck out of midair much to the surprise of Concordia goaltender Philippe Cadorette. The Stingers appealed to the referee that it was a high-stick but they ruled it was below the crossbar.
Jeff Braithwaite (Ennismore, Ont.) and Malik Jonshon (Montreal, Que.) recorded assists.
"We wanted to get off to a good start. Concordia is a team that plays with a lot of momentum so if they got on the board first we knew it was going to be a long night for us. We talked about getting off to a good start and every team is better after scoring the first goal."
Late in the period, freshman
Kyle Locke (Aurora, Ont.) would double-up the Ridgeback lead as he showed patience from the point and wristed one through a screen from
Erik Pedersen (Airdrie, Alta.).
Connor Jarvis (Port Union, Ont.) and Cam Yuill (Wellington, Ont.) would get assists.
Concordia dominated the next 20 minutes outshooting UOIT 16-5 but it was the Ridgebacks who scored the lone goal of period.
Danny Elser (Hopewell Junction, N.Y.), UOIT's leading scorer during the regular season, set up
Mike Robinson (Stouffville, Ont.) with a between the legs pass. Robinson failed to score but Elser put home the rebound for his second career playoff goal.
Loren Ulett (Port Perry, Ont.) added the second assist.
The third period was physical with both teams looking to send a message to one-another heading into game two. Johnson put the game away with an empty net shorthanded goal from his own end of the ice, with Braithwaite and
Ryan Doucette (Waterloo, Ont.) getting assists.
"It was a great team effort. We needed everyone involved and to contribute. That was a true team win tonight."
This was just the second time this season that Concordia was shutout. The Stingers had the top offence in the OUA eastern conference scoring 118 goals in 28 regular season games.
Final shots finished 35-26 in favour of Concordia. UOIT was 1-for-6 on the power play while Concordia was 0-for-7.
This was the third time in UOIT men's hockey history that the Ridgebacks won game one of a playoff series. UOIT's only playoff series win came last year against the Queen's Gaels.
QUICK LOOK AT THE RIDGEBACKS
Overall Record: 20-13-3
Conference Record: 16-11-1
Next game: Game Two – Friday, Feb. 17 at Concordia (7:30 p.m.)
