The Vancouver Giants out-chanced the Victoria Royals by a significant margin on Wednesday night, but fell 4-2 in the end after allowing three power play goals.
With the loss, the Giants’ record falls to 13-19-2-0 this season. Victoria improves to 21-12-0-2.
Scoring for the Giants was Ty Halaburda (12th) and Tyler Thorpe (team-leading 15th).
The Royals got power play goals from Cole Reschny (13th), Escalus Burlock (5th) and Tanner Scott (14th), as well as the game-winning-goal at even-strength from Nate Misskey (6th).
The Royals opened the scoring less than three minutes in, after Reschny made a quick move at the offensive blue line to gain the zone with speed, and then proceeded to fire a wrist shot past the glove side of Brett Mirwald to open the scoring.
Vancouver was able to generate several chances after allowing the game’s opening goal, but couldn’t beat goaltender Braden Holt on any of their 11 first period shots.
Thirty-two seconds in the second period, the Royals doubled their lead, after Burlock was the first one to the loose puck at the side of the goal and easily whacked it in to make the score 2-0 for the visitors.
It didn’t take long for the Giants to retake the momentum, and they did so in a big way, scoring twice within a span of 1:34.
First, Thorpe intercepted an exit pass just inside the offensive blue line and fed a tight pass to Lipinski, who then had a 2-on-1 with Halaburda. Lipinski set up Halaburda perfectly for the one-time blast, who made no mistake for his 12th goal of the season.
Shortly after that, the top line of Lipinski, Halaburda and Thorpe combined for another even-strength goal, this time after Thorpe deflected a point shot from Marek Howell past Holt to tie the game 2-2.
Before the second period was done, Victoria took back the lead, after Misskey one-timed a shot from the point off an offensive zone face-off.
With the Giants down 3-2 to start the third period, they were unable to generate much momentum on a 5-on-3 power play, but when the game went back to even strength, they got some good looks. Unfortunately Holt stopped all 10 shots he faced in the third period to deny the Giants comeback.
Victoria got a third period power play goal from Scott at the 10:53 mark to make the final score 4-2.
SOG: Vancouver — 11/11/10 = 32 | Victoria – 10/10/5 = 25
PP: Vancouver — 0/6 | VIC — 3/4
Face-offs: Vancouver — 36 | VIC — 26
3 Stars
1st: Vctoria – Cole Reschny – 1G,1A, 5 SOG
2nd: Vancouver – Tyler Thorpe – 1G, 1A, 3 SOG
3rd: Victoria – Braden Holt – 30 saves on 32 shots
In net
Vancouver: Brett Mirwald (21 saves/25 shots)
Victoria: Braden Holt (30 saves/32 shots)
The Giants host the Edmonton Oil Kings on Friday, Dec. 29, at 7 p.m. They close out their week on the road on Sunday, Dec. 31, with a New Year’s Eve clash in Portland against the Winterhawks starting at 5 p.m.
