Giants Effort Not Smart Enough

TBirds Chop Giants
Vancouver 2 Seattle 3

The boys had a good chance at a point and possibly two after gutting out a great come-back. Their first period was rough. They were lucky and unlucky and very unlucky and then fortunate they weren’t down by more than two after one. The puck was bouncing off of their sticks and moves they were making during their winning streak ended up being turnovers more often than not or less than perfect plays. Credit the boys for gutting it out and keeping up the effort, but they really missed the boat supporting the puck and too many times were making long passes. The TBirds got way too many chances and open looks in the first and Payton Lee was both great and ugly. He misplayed an easy puck, which he fell on and knocked into his own net. Luckily he got a quick whistle and what was a goal was suddenly, not a goal. Later he kicked out his right pad, robbing the TBirds of a sure goal. He also stopped a penalty shot chance in the first period. The Gs managed to tie the game up at 2s, but a bad give-away in their own zone eventually ended up in the back of their net with a couple of minutes left. A late PP chance for the Giants solved nothing.

Seattle opened the scoring a couple of minutes in. Not the best goal as it was scored unassisted coming off of some really poor puck management by the boys. The visitors used a PP chance to put themselves up by two. The Gs dodged a few bullets and despite some poor play throughout the rest of the first, they started to gain back some momentum by the end of the opening frame. It took until the latter half of the second for Jackson Houck to finally solve Taran Kozun. On a delayed penalty, Vladimir Bobylev got the puck to Tyler Benson, who had been buzzing in the zone. Benson passed it to Houck who slipped it in on the backhand. Alec Baer tied it up in the third driving the net and sliding it past Kozun. Bobylev and Arvin Atwal got the helpers. I think that might have been Bobylev’s first multi-point game. Some late scrambling in their own zone caused the Giants to fail to get the puck out and they paid the price.

Give the TBirds full credit for the win though. They were very quick to the puck and pressured the Giants all night, forcing some turnovers and not allowing them to make plays quickly enough. It was a pretty good physical game as well, ending with an almost line brawl. Were it five years ago it might have been a bench clearing melee, but in this hand-wringing era it was mostly pushing, some gloved punches and whole lotta yapping. Hardly what I consider to be good Canadian hockey. Gone are the days of Tristan Grant lifting Dustin Slade’s mask (when he was still playing for the Regina Pats) and pounding the goalie to dust. Kozun was good when he had to be, but the Giants could have pressured the TBirds D-men a bit more and forced the puck to the front of the net.

Team Notes: Kirichenko and Ronning still out with injuries. The Giants point streak is done at 8 games.

Fight Night: Dakota Odgers vs Luke Osterman – A toe to toe tilt, which was mostly dominated by Odgers. Odgers managed to get off Osterman’s helmet after a few big punches and then scored some clean shots before they were stopped.

Zebra Cage: Derek Zalaski and Ryan Benbow – Usually these two are the perfect storm of bad reffing, but tonight they were pretty consistent. Maybe a tad too quick on a few whistles, but in the end it was rare I was wondering what had been called or questioning the call.

The Giants out shot the Thunderbirds 35-24. They went 0 for 5 on the PP (scoring on a delayed penalty), while the TBirds were 1 for 4. Good effort, but it felt like the boys earned a better result in this one and need to learn how to make safer plays in their own zone down the stretch.

There were a lot of hungry Giants on the ice, but also a few passengers. Jesse Roach and Shaun Dosanjh felt pretty floaty to me, but really those were the only two who I thought should have brought a lot more effort to the rink. I saw a good hungry forecheck, but inefficient checking. There were a few good hits, but rarely did the Giants come away with the puck. All four lines had some chances. The story of the game really was small errors becoming a bit bigger and some dangerous passing and careless puck play that could have been worse. Too many passes right into the slot by Giants D-men in their own zone. Tyler Benson was unlucky not to get points in this one as he was all over the ice and made a couple of rookie errors and a bit of over-passing at times, but really you cannot fault his effort or seeing chances opening up. It was tenacious but careless hockey and lacked good puck support and some basic fundamentals, which were evident during their recent winning streak. It was also a good game, with some pretty decent hockey. Almost 7000 fans came away entertained, if a bit disappointed.

The Giants have a day of practice before taking on the Blazers at the Coliseum on Dec 30th. It would be nice to see them return to their winning streak form and clean up some of the holes they had in this game. I need to see a bit smarter hockey as well. Puck drops at 7pm on Tuesday.

Three Stars

1. Taran Kozun
2. Scott Eansor
3. Dakota Odgers

Dondo’s Hardhat: No clear hardhat player tonight, but a few guys I noticed every shift. One was Odgers and the other was Sward and another one was Benson (note all on different lines). Geertsen was his usual solid self, but I really liked Osipov’s game in this one. Some really smart plays with the puck, low hard shots getting through traffic and very savvy defensive plays. So I guess Osipov gets the marginal nod from me. Props to Bobylev for his two assists.