Two Much

Submitted by League Reporter, Jen Mutas

Game one of the semi-final series between the Coquitlam Adanacs and Delta Islanders had no shortage of excitement as the Islanders came into Coquitlam’s barn, held the A’s scoreless for the opening 24 minutes, held the lead until 1:02 left in the third period, and lost a heartbreaker in overtime by just one goal. Despite the low 6-5 score after 70 minutes of play between the two top scoring teams in the league, game one was most definitely one of the most entertaining games of the season and lucky for BCJALL fans- the semis are a best of five series.

Playing in front of a well drawn crowd in Ladner on Tuesday night, Delta had a carbon-copy start of Sunday night as they jumped ahead of the A’s early with two power play goals from Scott Jones and Mike Mallory. Four more goals at even strength and the Islanders found themselves up six goals just halfway into the first period. A hard drive to the net by Ben McIntosh got the Adanacs on the board, and a well executed play after a timeout at the end of the period gave the A’s their second goal with just 0.8 seconds left in the opening period. After six saves and five goals against, Coquitlam would switch up their goalies as Brodie MacDonald came in and replaced Dan Lewis in the first.

Playing with determination the A’s kept coming in the second period and this time it was Delta who was stifled for the period. Tor Reinholdt tied the game at six on an unassisted effort, and first year intermediate call-up Wesley Berg would give the A’s their first lead of the game as he completed his hat trick with five minutes left in the second period. Now trailing by two goals Delta would pull Zack Boychuk in favour of Blake Duncan with about four minutes to go in the middle frame.

Coquitlam’s momentum would carry over into the third as they not only managed to kill their only penalty of the period, but Mark Matthews would score just ten seconds after it expired, highlighting the Adanacs control of the game at that point. After thirty minutes without a goal, Logan Schuss got the Islanders back on the scoreboard and back within two. With seven minutes left in the game Scott Jones fired a shot at the Adanac net which took a funny bounce and snuck past MacDonald who whipped around to grab the ball off the line. Judging from the collective moan around the arena everyone agreed the ball was in except for the referee on the goal line whose emphatic arm movements indicated the ball never crossed the line. Travis Cornwall would throw in an empty netter for the A’s and the Delta Islanders would end up suffering another tough loss after a great start, with the final score being 10-7 in game two of this semi-final matchup.

With his three goals and three assists for Delta Tuesday night, Schuss moved into second place in post-season scoring with 20 points; and back in the lineup after being scratched for game one Mark Matthews scored six points for the A’s with two goals and four helpers in game two. Robert Church had four helpers for Coquitlam, and Matthew Dinsdale, McIntosh, and Berg each had three points in the winning effort for the A’s. At this point in the series the Islanders know what it’s going to take to get a win off the Adanacs as they have been very close in both games; expect to see another strong start from Delta on Friday night in Coquitlam for game three, and perhaps a tinge of desperation in their play as they try to avoid the sweep.