WATERLOO, Ont. - The Laurier Golden Hawks snapped their six-game losing streak with a 5-2 win over the #3 Brock Badgers.
It was a team effort with Jadon Reimer, Caleb Petrie, Conor Ali and Thomas Lenart all scoring. Christian Propp was spectacular, stopping 44 of 46 shots sent in his direction.
The Golden Hawks struck early against the Badgers. Reimer scored his first career OUA goal on a low shot that deflected off of a Badger in front and passed Jacob Hutchings at 1:55 into the opening period.
On a penalty kill halfway through the second period, Laurier's Caleb Petrie broke up a pass and used his wheels to create a break away from himself. He went backhand-forehand, but Hutchings stretched out to make the initial save. Petrie picked up buried his own rebound for his fourth goal of the season and put the Golden Hawks up 2-0.
Conor Ali further extended the Golden Hawk lead with a nice shot that he put past the blocker of Hutchings. Patrick Brown picked up an assist on the goal. He is starting to heat up as he has had points in each of his last three games and 7 points in his last 9 games.
In the last minute of the second period, Jonah Boria went end-to-end and shoveled a shot past Propp.
Early in the third period, Thomas Lenart made a nice move around Brock's defenseman to give himself enough time and space to send a low shot past Hutchings to give the Golden Hawks a 4-1 lead.
Some extracurriculars after the whistle resulted in a four-minute power play for the purple and gold with 4:24 remaining in the game.
Unfortunately, Brock took advantage of the situation and scored a shorthanded goal to pull themselves back within two goals.
Petrie again used his speed to win a footrace to the puck and pushed the puck into the back of the net to secure a 5-2 victory for the Golden Hawks.
Saturday's game marked the fourth straight game where a Laurier netminder faced 40-plus shots. Christian Propp faced 144 shots in his last three starts and has stopped 136 of them, good enough for a staggering 0.944 save percentage.
But while the shot numbers are up, "shots from the prime areas are starting to get down and ultimately that's the goal," said Head Coach Kevin Forrest, "we don't get too caught up in the shots, rather where they are coming from. Focusing on defending the middle which I thought we were better at this weekend."
Netminder Christian Propp had similar comments on the matter. "If you look at the game there are a lot of shots, but they are coming from the perimeter. If we protect the middle of the ice we'll be okay. Playing that way, we may give up more on the shot clock, but the quality of our defensive zone has been a lot better."
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PLUS/MINUS
Plus + Confidence Booster
Snapping a six-game skid against one of the top teams in the country must feel pretty good. Snapping Brock's eight-game heater in the process must make victory that much sweeter.
"This game definitely brings back the confidence after a tough stretch. We are just happy to get one and move on from that" said Caleb Petrie.
"It's huge for our confidence. If you look at those six games, they're close games and we're just on the wrong side of it," said Propp, "a win against a team of this calibre is huge for our morale."
"We had a pretty [bad] losing streak going there, it feels really good to get this win. This game showed that if we stay the course and stick with it, we can do a lot of good things against some tough teams," said Kevin Forrest.
UP NEXT
The Golden Hawks shift gears and hit the road for their final two games before the winter break. They are set to take on the Ontario Tech Ridgebacks on Thursday at the Campus Ice Center in Oshawa at 4:00 p.m. Follow @WLUAthletics for live updates and catch all the action on OUA.tv.
