After a big home win against Trinity Western, the Clan travelled up to Castlegar for a crucial two game road trip against Selkirk College — the team they lost to last year in the finals. The teams split the two games, but SFU is still in the lead, albeit by only a single point now.
The first game got off to an inconspicuous start, with no goals being scored by either team. In the second, though, it all came apart. Four goals in the span of just over 10 minutes put the game away for Selkirk, despite captain Jono Ceci doing his best to bring his team back in it.
“It was one of those seven-to-10 minute brain lapses [where] you just go into into a shell and everything you try and do doesn’t go right,” Head Coach Mark Coletta told The Peak. “Selkirk plays a very swarming mentality style of two or three guys on the puck and, they feed off their crowd [. . .] you get caught up in that moment and before you know it, they’ve banged in four goals.”
The second game began looking much like the first. After the first period, the Clan were down 2–0 and looked like Selkirk were on their way to winning it. However, goals from Smerek in the second and Berry-Lamontagna in the third forced it into a shootout, where Berry Lamontagna scored again to give his team the win.
What made the win even more remarkable was that it moved SFU’s record in shootouts to 6–0. The only other team in the league to have won in the shootout is Trinity Western, a team that has only managed to win once the entire season.
“We do do a fun style of shootout that we practice every week,” explained Coletta. “The guys have fun with it so it gives them a chance to be creative and have fun with it. When they’re in that situation in a game, I think it’s just second nature to them.”
What may be concerning for the team is the lack of production on the powerplay over the weekend. The Clan went one for 13 on the powerplay over the two games, which translates to just under eight percent on the man advantage. Coach Coletta didn’t sugarcoat his team’s struggles in this facet of the game.
“Some people might think to use excuses and say ‘well the ice is smaller there, it’s a low ceiling roof and blah blah blah,’ and it’s no good for our skill guys. And that’s a load of garbage.”
Coletta continued, “The bottom line is our skill guys gotta make plays, doesn’t matter if the ice is olympic sheet, NHL sheet. [. . .] Our guys that are privileged enough to be on the powerplay have to execute. So that’s on them. We’ll make some minor adjustments, but they have proven that they can do it before, so I don’t discount the fact that it’s on them and they’re going to get better.”
The Clan’s final home game will be this Saturday at Bill Copeland against University of Victoria. Puck drop is at 7 p.m.
