Miner shuts down powerful Raiders
Giants’ goalie puts on a first-star show for national TV audience as team extends run to seven games
Trent Miner’s evening media scrum was on par with his game on Thursday.
The second-year Giants goaltender made 31 saves and was selected first star after Vancouver secured a 3-1 win over Canada’s No. 1 ranked Prince Albert Raiders before a crowd of 4,034 at Langley Events Centre and a national Sportsnet television audience.
It was the seventh consecutive win for Vancouver (30-122-0) and just the fourth time this Western Hockey League season that Prince Albert (406-0-2) has been held under two goals.
There were 140 NHL personnel in the building, which bodes well for the 2019 draft eligible Miner. He was left out of Wednesday’s CHL Top Prospects game in Red Deer despite having the WHL’s second-best goals-against average (1.86) and save percentage (. 933). He owns a 14-31-0 record.
“I think it’s just another game,” Miner said of the starfilled showcase in Red Deer, which featured Giants’ defenceman Bowen Byram as well as Prince Albert forward Brett Leason.
“At the end of the day, I didn’t try out for the Top Prospects Game. I tried out of the Vancouver Giants this year. To win today was bigger than any Top Prospects Game.”
The victory gave Vancouver a 15-point lead atop the B.C. Division on the second-place Victoria Royals (23-20-1-0). The Giants haven’t won the division since 2009-10, which also marks the last season they won a playoff round. Vancouver lost in seven games in the first round last spring to the Royals.
The Giants were an honourable mention in this week’s CHL rankings.
Part of their success this season stems from having the best goalie tandem in the franchise’s 18 years.
Third-year goalie David Tendeck, 19, was picked to the WHL West Conference second all-star team last year and was drafted in the sixth round by the Arizona Coyotes last June. Tendeck is 16-9-1-0 with a 2.51 goals against and a .907 save percentage this season.
Both goalies were ill earlier this week; Miner started Thursday because he was the healthier of the two, said Vancouver coach Michael Dyck.
Miner was also the first star in Vancouver’s previous outing, a 2-1 overtime win last Saturday over the Moose Jaw Warriors in which he stopped 26 shots.
When Dyck guided the Lethbridge Hurricanes to a spot in the in 2007-08 WHL final, he platooned goalies Juha Metsola and Michael Maniago until the playoffs, so it wouldn’t be surprising to see him continue to rotate Miner and Tendeck.
“I think for me, Dave and the team, we were comfortable with either of us playing against a team like Prince Albert,” said Miner, who was the No. 6 North American goalie in NHL Central Scouting’s recent midterm rankings. “I know Dave would have done just as good, if not better.”
Brayden Watts opened the scoring for the Giants and Davis Koch counted a pair, including his third consecutive game-winner, snapping a shot past Raiders goalie Ian Scott at the 8:37 mark of the third period.
Brayden Pachal snuck a screened shot past Miner at 18:32 of the third period to make it 2-1, but Koch added an empty-netter with 28 seconds left to ice the win.
Koch, an overage centre, now has goals in six consecutive games and points in seven straight. He leads Vancouver with 49 points, including 18 goals, in 44 games.
It was a disciplined, structured contest, with Vancouver playing more chip-and-chase than normal, particularly early on, in a bid to get past a Prince Albert team that excels at standing up at its blue-line, creating turnovers and then racing away on the counterattack.
“I think it does a lot for confidence,” Dyck said of the win. “That’s probably as close to a playoff game as we’ve played. It was a playoff game in a playoff atmosphere on national television, and I thought we responded.”