The Portage College hockey team dropped a 4-2 decision Sunday to the NAIT Ooks at the Bold Centre after 40 minutes of tight play.
The Voyageurs defense improved, but the team still couldn't hold off the league champions.
The Portage College hockey team dropped a 4-2 decision Sunday to the NAIT Ooks at the Bold Centre after 40 minutes of tight play.
Voyageurs head coach Jim Knight said that defense was a weakness in 5-0 and 7-2 losses to the Ooks earlier in the week, and changes provided results. However, a dizzy sequence of three goals in the third period saw the game get away from Portage.
"For 40 minutes, it was a great game. If you were a fan of watching hockey today here in Lac La Biche, you were entertained," said head coach Jim Knight.
"It does sting a little bit... it was a good learning experience for our guys. We fine-tuned a little bit of the d-zone and it worked a little bit."
The Voyageurs posted a scoreless first period and kept a spotless penalty kill for the whole game. When NAIT took the lead with a goal in the second period, Portage's Landon Kadatz responded less than three minutes later with the help of Cory Giroux and Kyle Threndyle to stop the Ooks from building momentum.
But in the third period, NAIT pounced again. Joshua Lazowski beat Halcrow four minutes in to put them on the chase, and three minutes later Michael Piluso came down the left wing boards, looped behind the net and scored glove-side. He got a second marker in 16 seconds, and all of a sudden Portage was looking at a three-goal deficit.
"In 30 seconds... we gave up two goals, and that was the difference in the hockey game." Knight said. "The third goal is a bad-angle goal, they score it, and then the next one is a loose-puck battle... now you're chasing a very good hockey club."
A power-play goal from captain Dustin Popowitch with six minutes left followed by a pair of NAIT penalties in quick sequence gave hope that perhaps the Voyageurs might get into striking distance, but despite a great chance from Kadatz during a brief 26-second two-man advantage, they couldn't get any closer.
Organization failed Portage when, with less than two minutes remaining, they took a too-many-men-on-the-ice penalty, which made Jesse Hall throw his stick in frustration in the penalty box.
While NAIT moves to first place in the league after the win Sunday, Portage remains in a dogfight with Concordia University College of Alberta, one point back in the standings, for the last playoff place.
There are four games left in the regular-season schedule. Both sides will face the University of Alberta-Augustana, but on the last weekend of the season Portage takes on Red Deer College, a playoff team, while Concordia has a two-game visit to last-place Briercrest College in Saskatchewan.
"We have to control our own destiny, we can't worry about Concordia," Knight said, who noted that Briercrest won both games against Grant MacEwan University at the end of January. "That's not a very easy trip to make for a school when you make that nine-hour trek into Saskatchewan, it's a very small barn... Concordia is going to have their hands full."
The second to last regular-season Voyageurs home game will be next Friday against Augustana at 7:00 in the Bold Center.
