You could say the New Westminster Salmonbellies are built for speed.
But the Maple Ridge Burrards had the equivalent of a tiger in the tank in its13-9 victory over New West on Tuesday in Game 1 of the best-of-seven semifinal at Queen’s Park Arena.
The Burrards’ Riley Loewen converted two powerplay chances and added two shorthanded goals, while netminder Frank Scigliano turned aside 49 shots as Maple Ridge dominated when it needed to in the Western Lacrosse Association series opener. Game 2 is slated for Friday at the Cam Neely Arena in Maple Ridge.
“It seemed we took a penalty any time we had a little bit of momentum going, so we have to be a bit more disciplined than that,” said New West coach Steve Goodwin. “We can’t be taking penalties especially when we just scored a goal... We did that two or three times and that just seemed to kill our momentum.”
The first period was a wide-open scorer’s showcase, with the teams combining for 12 goals on 35 shots. A junior Bellie alumnus, Scigliano was rock-solid in the early going while his teammates built a quick lead.
Loewen scored his first marker of the night shorthanded at 8:06 of the first, countering a two-goal run by the Bellies after Maple Ridge had opened with a 3-0 lead. While New West rallied and pulled within a goal on Jordan McBride’s second of the period, Loewen delivered a key powerplay marker and stole the momentum with 47 seconds left in the first.
It's a theme that would repeat itself during the night.
Mike Messenger brought the Bellies back within one early in the second, only to be answered by three Maple Ridge knocks -- including a powerplay tally by Loewen. Down 10-6 with two minutes to play in the period, the home team again closed the gap on goals by Messenger and Logan Schuss to create a possible come-back scenario for the third.
Unfortunately, the Burrards kept up the pace in the final frame, outscoring New West 3-1.
“It’s just first game jitters, its going to be a long series and we just have to keep working hard,” said McBride. “We could have used a couple of bounces and we got within two a couple of times and if we scored there it could have changed the momentum.”
Going 1-for-6 on the powerplay was also an area of concern.
“We spent an hour (Monday) working on our special teams," said Goodwin. "It’s one game and what it came down to is they outplayed us on special teams. We’re going to be better next game... We felt confident, we won every game thinking we were going to win (during the season) and went into this game thinking we were going to win. You take away the 10-12 minutes of the first period and I think we win this game."
For the Bellies, McBride ended up with a hat trick while Schuss and Messenger tallied two each.
Mitch Jones and Anthony Malcom counted a goal apiece.
Mike Mallory scored four times and set up four others for the visitors.
“(Maple Ridge has) a very good offence and we knew that going in. We think we have a very good defence and obviously it didn’t show it as much tonight but we’ll re-adjust and be better,” added Goodwin.
The series continues Friday in Maple Ridge and returns to Queen’s Park on Saturday for Game 3, with faceoff at 7:45 p.m.
