WINNIPEG — The Manitoba Bisons men's hockey team played host to the Trinity Western Spartans on Saturday, Jan. 29 at the Wayne Fleming Arena. This was the first-ever Canada West matchup between the two western Canadian universities as the Spartans joined the conference at the start of the 2021-22 season.
The Bisons jumped out to an early 2-0 lead after goals from Carter Doerksen and Tony Apetagon in the first period. However, the Spartans offence exploded in the second period with five unanswered goals when Josh Bruce, Jamieson Ree, Travis Verveda, Logan Casavant and Michael Spafford each scored for Trinity Western.
Manitoba scored three unanswered goals of their own in the third to narrow the visitors lead to 6-5. In the end, the five unanswered goals in the second proved to be too much for the Bisons to overcome as the visitors went on to claim a 7-5 victory.
"We felt good about our start tonight despite giving up those two goals," said Spartans captain Spencer Gerth. "I think we showed a lot of character in the way we were able to come out and score those five unanswered goals."
The loss keeps Manitoba six points behind Regina for the final playoff spot in the conference, but the Herd still have three games in hand on the Cougars.
Manitoba's Doerksen scored his first goal of the season to open the scoring. Duncan Pierce won the face-off straight back to Doerksen who put his shot on net, beating Spartans goalie Talor Joseph five-hole to give the hosts the 1-0 lead at 8:28 of the opening period.
Next it was Apetagon who cashed in. At 15:58 of the first, Hayden Ostir's slot shot took a wild bounce into the air, landing in the goal crease behind Joseph. Apetagon was positioned nicely to take advantage of the favourable bounce, making it 2-0 for Manitoba with his fourth goal of the season.
The momentum of the game flipped on the Bisons when they gave up the five goals in the second period. Combined with second-year defenceman Liam Schioler being ejected for crosschecking, Manitoba struggled to find offence in the middle frame.
The third period began with a steady parade to the penalty box for both teams. With Manitoba on the power play, Chase Hartje mishandled a pass at the offensive blue line giving Spartans forward Josh Borynec a breakaway opportunity. Borynec made no mistake and beat Link for the shorthanded goal, making it 6-2 for the visitors.
The Bisons began to mount their comeback with the two goals from Veloso and one from Skoleski to pull back to within one of the Spartans. The Herd believed for a moment they had tied the game with 30 seconds left when Jameson put the puck in the net but the referees called the Bisons for a too-many-men penalty. Trinity Western added an empty net goal to make the final score 7-5.
Both teams will be back at Wayne Fleming Arena tomorrow at 1 p.m. to finish off the two-game weekend set.
