The StFX X-Men dropped the puck on 2013 with a pair of weekend home victories in AUS regular season hockey action. They handled Moncton 5-1 on Friday night and followed up with a 3-0 shutout over St. Thomas on Saturday.
In Saturday’s win over the visiting St. Thomas Tommies, after a scoreless first period, Brad Cuzner of the X-Men opened the scoring at 9:50 of the second, depositing a rebound behind St. Thomas goaltender Jonathan Groenheyde.
Cuzner corralled the rebound off a Murdock MacLellan blast, with Derek Claffey earning the second assist on the marker.
MacLellan doubled the advantage only 52 seconds into the third period when a point shot from Nick Pageau deflected off the X-Men captain’s leg and behind Groenheyde. A cross-ice pass from Jason Bast, who notched the other assist, started the scoring play.
At 9:54, Michael Kirkpatrick’s backhander past Groenheyde rounded out the scoring. The second-year X-Man broke in alone after taking a pass from Bast. His initial wrist shot was turned aside, but Kirkpatrick showed quick hands in making no mistake on the rebound.
To make the breakaway pass to Kirkpatrick, just inside the St. Thomas blue-line, Bast made a diving pass against two Tommie defenders. Claffey, the Subway player of the game, had the other assist.
The X-Men outshot the Tommies 28 to 10. Fifth-year goaltender Joey Perricone recorded the shutout for the X-Men.
Grounded Eagles
Friday night, the X-Men started the second half with a convincing 5-1 home ice win over the Université de Moncton Aigles Bleus.
The blue and white jumped to a 2-0 lead in the first five minutes of the opening period.
At 3:52, freshman Cole Grbavac deposited a rebound from the lip of the crease behind Aigles Bleus goaltender Adrien Lemay to give the X-Men a 1-0 advantage. R.D. Chisholm and McAvoy collected assists on the marker.
Forty-eight seconds later, at 4:40, Cuzner skated down the left wing and handcuffed Lemay with a hard wrist shot to double the X-Men lead. Line-mates Steven Kuhn and MacLellan garnered the assists.
The “KMC” line – Kuhn, MacLellan and Cuzner collected eight points in the match-up. Kuhn garnered three assists and MacLellan chipped in one goal and two assists, while Cuzner scored a pair of goals.
Cuzner’s second goal, at 19:04 of the first period, gave the X-Men a 3-0 lead. The first-year X-Man from Glace Bay squeezed a rebound behind Lemay, with assists going to MacLellan and Kuhn.
In the first period, the X-Men outshot the Aigles Bleus 19 to seven.
After a scoreless second period, MacLellan extended the X-Men lead to 4-0 at 3:06 of the third period. McAvoy, with his second point of the game, and Kuhn collected the assists.
At 8:57, the Aigles Bleus solved X-Men goaltender Drew Owsley, when Guillaume Parenteau scored on a floating shot through a screen, with no chance for the goaltender to snag the attempt with his glove hand. Christopher Guay and Eric Faille collected the Moncton assists.
X-Men forward Jarrad Struthers wrapped up the scoring at 15:57 when he put a Bronson Maschmeyer rebound into a wide open net.
Maschmeyer, a first-year defenseman, pinched in off the blue-line and took a cross-ice pass from Zackary MacQueen, but Lemay made the initial pad save before Struthers converted. Maschmeyer and MacQueen scored assists for their effort on the play.
For the game, the X-Men outshot the Aigles Bleus 49-24.
Owsley, with 23 saves – many of the stellar variety – earned Subway player-of-the-game honours.
With the wins, the X-Men improve to 11-5-2 on the AUS regular season for 24 points and fourth place in the tightly contested conference standings. Only four points separate first through fourth positions.
The blue and white will return to action Friday, Jan. 11 when they host the UNB Varsity Reds at the Keating Centre. The next day (Jan. 12), the UPEI Panthers will be the visitors. Puck drop for both games is 7:00 p.m.
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