Antigonish, NS - The StFX X-Men captured their fifth consecutive victory with a 4-0 win over the St. Thomas Tommies in AUS hockey action Friday night.

At 4:09 of the first period, sophomore forward Blake Gal (Lethbridge, AB) opened the scoring for the X-Men in front of a partisan home crowd of more than 600 at the Keating Centre.

Gal made a nifty deflection off a Trey Lewis (Aldouane, NB) point shot, which made its way behind Tommies goaltender Philippe Trudeau (Blainville, QC). Michael Kirkpatrick (North Sydney, NS), who made the point feed to Lewis, notched the other assist.

"I went to the net and luckily the puck hit my stick," Gal said after the game, crediting Kirkpatrick and Lewis for their set-up. "They did a great job."

At 17:14, Steven Kuhn (Oyen, AB) made no mistake with a blast from the slot after taking a centering pass from new X-Men forward Kristoff Kontos (Penetanguishene, ON). Kontos got the puck from Rob Slaney (Conception Bay, NL), after the StFX captain dislodged the puck from a St. Thomas defender with a hard check behind the net.

The teams played to a scoreless second period, with the X-Men outshooting the Tommies 24 to 17 after 40 minutes.

Both clubs came up empty on power play chances in the middle frame.

With a pair of special team goals in the third period, the X-Men sealed the deal.

At 47 seconds, Cole Grbavac (Calgary, AB) deposited a rebound behind Trudeau with a sliding backhander on the power play. The rebound came from a Gal slap shot, who assisted, along with Kirkpatrick.

After a St. Thomas miscue behind their own net, Cory MacIntosh (North Sydney, NS) got the loose puck in front of an empty cage. His shorthanded marker at 6:32 was unassisted.

Drew Owsley (Lethbridge, AB) turned aside 26 shots for the shutout win, while Trudeau made 30 saves in the loss.

The three stars of the game were Owsley, Gal and Marc-Andre Levesque (Longueuil, QC) of the Tommies.

With the win, the X-Men improve to 17-7-1, while the Tommies drop to 2-19-4.

St. Thomas returns to action Saturday when they visit Halifax to face the CIS #6 ranked Saint Mary's Huskies.

On the same day, StFX will host the UPEI Panthers at the Keating Centre.

"We have to get pucks deep and make them play a full game," Gal said. "It is always a good one when we play the Panthers."

Puck drop for both games is 7 p.m.

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