The UPEI Panthers men’s hockey team overcame a two-goal, second period deficit Friday night to down the nation’s top-ranked UNB Varsity Reds 3-2 in Atlantic University Sport action.
UPEI’s Devin Praught was met with deafening applause in Charlottetown’s MacLauchlan Arena when he scored the game-winning goal at 5:17 in the third period for the Panther’s second win of the season against UNB.
UPEI now sits at a 6-5 regular season record. The Panthers host St Thomas Tommies tonight at 7 p.m.
Head coach Forbes MacPherson said while the Panthers were slow to start, players kicked in an impressive effort during the second and third periods for the win.
The challenge will be to continue that effort, he said.
“The challenge for our team is to play the way we did tonight for every single game,” said MacPherson. “It doesn’t matter whose coming in or where we’re going, if we can play the way we did tonight (Friday) then we’ll like our chances.”
Praught said the win came from a team effort, with no small thanks to goalie Mavric Parks, who stopped 28 of 30 shots. UNB’s Seamus Bowen blocked 32 of the Panthers’ 35 shots.
The game wasn’t looking good for UPEI during the first period, with UNB’s Matt Fillier opening the scoring short-handed at 9:02.
Optics were even worse early in the second period, when UNB’s Kyle Bailey netted a power-play goal from the blue line only 10 seconds into the middle frame.
That’s when the Panthers stepped it up, said Praught.
“Parksy (Mavric Parks) let one up that he probably wanted to get back, but he’s made a lot of big saves for us, so we just kind of responded to that,” said Praught. “(We) stepped up as a team and everyone in that dressing room tonight played a great game.’’
“We were a little hesitant in the first period and we had a chat in between the first and second, and the guys came out and started to compete a lot harder,” said MacPherson. “We loved the way we played in the final two periods.”
UPEI fought back hard in the second, with Chris Desousa scoring on a powerplay at 16:42.
The Panthers then evened up the score only 30 seconds after Desousa’s goal, with Jared Gomes finding the net at 17:12.
Both teams fought hard going into a nail-biting third period, but it was Praught who would find the net at 5:17 for the game-winner.
“It’s definitely nice to come out and beat a team like that,” said Praught about the defending CIS champions. “Our challenge is to show up again tomorrow night and come with the same game plan and hopefully we come out on top.”
After a 6-3 setback to the St. Thomas Tommies on the road two weeks ago, the Panthers will face the team on home ice tonight at MacLauchlan Arena.
