By William Brown
Jamie Wise scored a hat-trick, and Dominic Alberga and Mitchell Gallant scored twice as the Ryerson Rams men’s hockey team thumped the Concordia Stingers 8-3 on Saturday night at the Mattamy Athletic Centre.
It was the final game before the winter break, and the team ended the first half of its season with a 10-5 record.
“Everybody on the team has contributed and worked hard, so we’re happy to be sitting where we are,” said head coach Graham Wise. “If someone said you’d be ten and five at Christmas time in September, I’m quite sure we would have taken it.”
The Rams started the offence quickly, as Mitchell Gallant opened the scoring off a woeful giveaway from the Stingers’ Adam Strumas. Gallant intercepted an errand pass from the defenceman and slid it five-hole on the goalie.
The Stingers tied it up just over a minute later, when Jessyco Bernard scored on a slick passing play off a three-on-one rush.
But that goal was countered by three Rams goals in quick succession. Wise scored his first of three on the night on backhand shot to regain Ryerson’s lead before Alberga was left wide open in front of the net and snapped a shot blocker-side off Wise’s centering pass. Three minutes later, Wise would score again on a high glove side shot to make in 4-1.
Ryerson would score once more in the second period before scoring three goals in the third.
“It’s just another game,” said Wise, on his hat-trick. “I’m here to score goals for my team, and tonight it was working; it was clicking. I got lucky with my line mates, and it all just happened.”
The game followed a 5-1 loss that coach Wise called “an abysmal performance”, so the players were happy to make up for it in a dominant win.
“We feel better than yesterday,” said Alberga. “We didn’t have a good game yesterday, so we had to end the weekend on a high note, and I think we did that today.”
The game concluded the first half of the season, and the team will return to the ice on Friday, Jan. 4 when they do battle with the Laurier Goldenhawks..
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