The Victoria Shamrocks held a dominant 52-33 edge in shots, using a 3-0 second period to down Maple Ridge 7-4 on Friday evening and stay undefeated early in the season. Burrards goalie Frankie Scigliano made 45 saves including stopping 29-of-33 over the first and third periods to keep Maple Ridge within striking distance.
Maple Ridge scored the first two goals of the third period, both on the power play, to pull back within 4-3 just over five minutes into the stanza. Victoria responded with the next three to begin pulling away.
Corey Small and Rhys Duch led Victoria with four points apiece behind two goals and two assists, recording 14 and 12 shots, respectively. Bradley Kri also dished a pair of assists. Andrew Murphy led Maple Ridge with two goals and two assists. Daniel Amesbury had 20 penalty minutes, all coming from a late third-period fight that led to a game misconduct.
Maple Ridge got on the board first at 4:11 of the first period. Despite holding a 13-10 shot advantage, the Shamrocks didn’t tie the score until four seconds on the first-period clock.
Victoria used that momentum to score the only three goals of the second period. The Shamrocks held a 19-12 shot advantage as goalie Matt Flindell stopped all 12 shots sent his way.
The Burrards scored two power play goals to pull within 4-3, but Duch, Small and Derek Lowe responded with three straight to make it 7-3 midway through the third period. Murphy scored Maple Ridge’s second even strength goal and first in 52:47 of action, but it proved too little, too late.
With the win, Victoria improves to 4-0-1 while Maple Ridge falls to 2-3-0. The teams will rematch on June 22 at Maple Ridge.
