Teddy Bear Toss game a Giant success
Nearly 9,000 watch Vancouver beat the visiting Tri-City Americans in charity event at Rogers Arena
The Vancouver Giants’ new mix looks like a match.
Winger Tyler Preziuso, who joined the team Saturday via trade with the Medicine Hat Tigers, had a pair of goals in a 4-1 win Sunday over the Tri City Americans before a crowd of 8,938 at Rogers Arena for the Giants’ Teddy Bear Toss charity game.
Winger Michal Kvasnica and defenceman Connor Horning, who made their Vancouver debuts only 10 days ago, added their first goals in Giants colours.
Kvasnica sent the stuffed animals cascading to the ice when he ripped a shot past Tri-City goalie Beck Warm on a rush at 4:04 of the opening period.
It’s only one night, and Tri City played Saturday in Spokane
with Vancouver sitting at home idle, but you can excuse Giants fans for thinking it’s something to build on.
The Giants (14-13-1-1) have underachieved the season, and general manager Barclay Parneta has started to revamp the roster in a bid to see if that can get them going.
Preziuso, 20, came over from Medicine Hat along with defenceman Trevor Longo, 19, in exchange for veteran Vancouver rearguard Dylan Plouffe, 20, and centre Lukas Svejkovsky, 18, who had left the team five games ago, unhappy with where his NHL draft season was at with the Giants.
“We needed to shake up our chemistry. Our chemistry wasn’t right,” said Giants coach Michael Dyck. “It’s starting to feel right. It’s a step forward. We’ve got a week to
practise before we go up against a really tough Everett Silvertip team on Saturday. We’ll really measure the bar there.”
Even with how worn out Tri-City (12-12-2-1) must have been, you can’t take away the fact Sunday may well have been Vancouver’s most complete effort of the season. They put up 53 shots.
The fourth line of Zack Ostapchuk, John Little and Krz Plummer was a factor all evening, and that hasn’t been something that’s been said often this season.
Goalie David Tendeck was his usual, steady, economical self in a 26-save outing.
Vancouver didn’t look like a team with a bunch of new guys, even though they were a team with a bunch of new guys.
“That’s a credit to the new guys fitting in,” said Dyck. “They didn’t get a chance to practise. It was a really quick tutorial on what we do. They’re good enough players. They were able to adapt.”
Dyck put Preziuso on the right side with Kvasnica, and Tristen Nielsen as their centre. Cole Shepard took Nielsen’s spot on left wing on Vancouver’s top line with Milos Roman and Justin Sourdif.
Evan Patrician, who had been receiving second-line minutes of late, went to the third line, between Jackson Shepard and Holden Katzalay.
The Giants recently added Katzalay from the BCHL’s Surrey Eagles, while Kvasnica had been playing in his native Czech Republic, and Horning was picked up in a trade from the Swift Current Broncos for fellow rearguard Kaleb Bulych.
“You add a guy like Preziuso up front, and now we’ve got guys playing in the right spots,” said Dyck of the scorer who now has 11 goals on the season. “We’re giving these guys a chance to succeed.”
All the stuffed toys thrown on the ice were gathered up and will be donated to the Lower Mainland Christmas Bureau. The Giants, in conjunction with the Vancouver Canucks, opted to move to Rogers Arena for the game to try to bring in a bigger crowd than they could get at the Langley Events Centre.
The Giants played the Teddy Bear game last season at the Pacific Coliseum and the announced crowd was 9,385.
“There’s the whole pro feel. It’s a pretty special experience here,” said Dyck, whose team used the Canucks’ dressing room Sunday.
The Giants wore special Grinch-themed uniforms for the game. They had ordered two extra jerseys without names, just in case. They stitched on names for Preziuso and Longo.
Parneta also added a firstround pick in the 2020 WHL bantam draft from the Tigers and he’s hinted that he’d like to use that as part of a package to bring in more forward help via trade.