By: Isabella Urbani Photo: Brandon David (BrandonDavidImages)
SURREY – The Surrey Eagles (1-1-0-0) faced off against the Langley Rivermen (1-0-0-0) in a Friday-Saturday showdown, with the first of two games taking place at the South Surrey Arena.
Eagles’ goaltender Colton Jugnauth played his first game of the season. The 05’, Kelowna product made his first-ever British Columbia Hockey League start with the team last season against Langley in a 5-2 win, recording his best stats of the season with a 2.00 goals against average and a .935 save percentage.
Despite Jugnauth stopping 41 out of 44 saves, including 18 in the first period, the Eagles were unable to score a second goal on Langley’s Bodee Weiss after forward Ryan Evenhuis notched his first goal of the season, batting home his own rebound, from Jackson Anderson and Massimo Fazio. 1-0 Surrey.
Langley drew even before the end of the period after UCONN commit, Mason Kesselring fired home the puck on a set play off the draw. The equalizer also stood as Kesselring’s first goal of the season. 1-1. Shots 19-10 Langley.
Just when it looked like the second would tick away with no action on the scoresheet minus a two-minute Eagles penalty for interference in the opening half of the middle frame, the Rivermen doubled down on more first goals of the season. This time it was forward Will Shepard’s drive from his own side of centre, finished with a snapshot from the top of the circle in the final 90 seconds of the period that gave Langley the big go-ahead goal heading into the third. 2-1 Langley. Shots 16-11 Langley.
In a testy third, in which the Eagles were penalized three times, Langley scored the insurance marker on the seventh powerplay opportunity of the game. Rivermen Captain Tyler Chan wrestled a loose puck away from Jugnauth to a waiting Ryan Schelling open at the side of the net from a point shot that came through traffic. 3-1 Langley.
Langley would officially seal off any opportunity for the Eagles to pull off some last-minute magic with an empty netter from an errand pass that Rivermen forward Ethan Merner chased down. 4-1 Langley. Shots 45-35 Langley.
Langley goaltender Weiss picked up the first star after backtracking his team to victory with 34 saves on 35 shots, staying perfect through two periods after giving up the game’s first goal. He was followed by his teammate Shepard with the second star. Jugnauth prevented the clean sweep for Langley, earning the third star of the evening. Eagles teammate Fazio was the FortisBC Energy Player of the Game.
Surrey (1-2-0-0) will be home next for their first game in October against the Naniamo Clipers (1-3-0-0). Puck drop is at 7:45 p.m
