By: Andrew Roberts
The Ryerson men’s hockey team (5-3-1) lost 3-2 in double overtime to the Windsor Lancers (10-0-0) at the Mattamy Athletic Centre Friday night.
The game was the first time Ryerson got to play in the new overtime rules. Now, teams play five minutes of four-on-four and then five minutes of three-on-three before the shootout.
Despite ending their three-game winning streak, the Rams battled hard, hammering 41 shots on goal in the game.
Rams head coach Graham Wise said that while the outcome may be disappointing, the team should still be grateful for one point.
“You can’t change what just happened,” Wise said. “We got a point out of it, [and] not to many teams have taken points from this team.”
The Rams were down early in the first after Windsor’s Dylan Denomme tapped home a goal off a strong backhander down low in the slot. The Lancers added another tally in the second, leaving the Rams down 2-0 heading into the third.
“They’re a great hockey team,” said Wise. “We knew we would have our hands full tonight.”
The Lancers lead the Ontario University Athletics (OUA) with five goals-per-game, and have scored a league leading 12 of them on the powerplay. On the flip side, their penalty kill is an average 79.2 per cent, which is 12th in the league.
However, it wasn’t until Windsor committed their seventh penalty of the game that Rams defenseman Alex Basso finally got the Rams on the board. Clapping home his second goal of the season, Basso now has 9 points in 8 games, and is tied for tenth in points amongst Canadian Interuniversity Sport (CIS) defensemen.
“They have four good lines and six good [defensemen]… so it’s a bit tougher playing a good team like that,” Basso said. “We battled back, and it builds a lot of character going down throughout the season.”
Ryerson pulled their goalie, Troy Passingham, with 19 seconds remaining in regulation, and left-winger Domenic Alberga was able to tie the game and push it to overtime.
The game-winning goal came when Windsor had a four-on-three powerplay in the second overtime period. Windsor’s Drew Palmer fired a low shot past Passingham to secure the win.
“We knew we had to play our style of game… [and] set the tempo [to] show these guys it’s not going to be an easy win,” Alberga said. “I think [we’ll] use this loss as determination for tomorrow’s game.”
The Rams are back in action at 4 p.m. tomorrow afternoon when they visit the Laurier Golden Hawks [3-5-0] at the Brantford Civic Centre.
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