Huskies stymied in Alberta
Bears 5, Huskies 0
The University of Saskatchewan Huskies could not recover Friday night after giving up two power-play goals in the first period.
The host University of Alberta Golden Bears played a near-perfect game on their way to a 5-0 victory at Clare Drake Arena to take a 1-0 lead in the best-of-three Canada West final.
Game 2 will be played Saturday night, also at Clare Drake. A third game, if necessary, would be played Sunday on the U of A campus.
Hemmed into their zone for most of the opening 20 minutes, the Dogs gave up three unanswered goals to dig themselves into an early hole.
Brett Ferguson’s wraparound beat U of S goalie Ryan Holfeld, who was caught out of position, at 4:24.
A pair of similar power play goals — by Jordan Hickmott at 6:45 and Johnny Lazo at 17:58, both on backdoor shots up and over the stickside of a sliding Holfeld — made it 3-0 after one.
The teams were scoreless in the second period.
In the third, Alberta jumped ahead 4-0 early in the third period on another goal by Hickmott, this one at 3:10.
That was it for Holfeld, who was replaced by backup David Reekie.
Travis Toomey made it 5-0 a short time later.
Alberta went 2-for-7 on the power play. Saskatchewan went 0-for-2.
The Golden Bears outshot the Huskies 45-12 in a dominant home-ice performance.
Nothing went right for Saskatchewan, which had a goal by Chris Durand disallowed with 3:56 remaining.
Kurtis Mucha made 12 saves for the shutout, including a big save on Cody Smuk during a short-handed breakaway in the third period.
The two teams split their Canada West conference regular season series 2-2 with all four games decided by one goal.
The Huskies picked up their two wins on home ice. The Bears won both of their games on home ice.
Both teams have qualified for the upcoming PotashCorp University Cup national championship tournament at Credit Union Centre.