Seattle Thunderbirds goaltender Marek Sklenicka has a very good night, which meant a bad night for Vancouver Giants, who fired 39 shots on on Friday night, but only beat Sklenicka once in a 4-1 loss at Langley Events Centre.
Giants earned a 1-0 and 12-4 edge in shots on goal after one period.
Seattle responded with two second periods goals, then added a power play marker and empty-netter in the third period to secure the win.
Tobias Tomik had the lone goal for Vancouver.
Noah Kosick, Sawyer Mayes, Coster Dunn and Cameron Schmidt had the tallies for the Thunderbirds.
Giants head coach Parker Burgess, Head Coach of the Vancouver Giants said “you’re not going to win too many games only scoring one goal. That was kind of the story tonight.”
“Any time you get 39, 40 shots on net, you’ve got a to find a way to capitalize and convert on some of those.”
Giants scored at the 15:11 mark of the first period, after Jakob Oreskovic drew multiple defenders to him in the left circle before passing back to the slot to Tomik for the one-timer and Tomik’s 11th of the season.
Sklenicka made 11 first period saves to keep the Giants lead to just 1-0 after 20 minutes.
Vancouver started the second period strong as well, but this time Seattle scored against the run of the play – tying the game at the 3:23 mark off a passing play between Kosick, Schmidt and Dunn.
The T-Birds grabbed their first lead of the game midway through the middle frame off the stick of Mayes, who lifted the puck over Pyne from right in front of the net after a between the legs drop pass from Ethan Bibeau.
Midway through the third period, the Giants were called for holding in the offensive zone, which lead to a Seattle power play goal from Dunn, to stretch the visitors lead to 3-1.
Vancouver started to pour it on later in the final frame, including a couple of partial breakaways for Adam Tiltbach and additional high danger shots with the goalie pulled, but Sklenicka made multiple stops.
Schmidt added an empty net goal for the Thunderbirds with 52 seconds remaining in the game to make the final score 4-1
Vancouver falls to 21-34-1-2 (45 points), while Seattle improves to 24-26-4-3 (55 points), currently three points out of the playoffs.
Next, Giants take on Kamloops on the road on Saturday at Sandman Centre at 6 p.m.