Giants 5 @ PG 4 (SO) Oct 4th

[Swando]

WOW... hard to believe such a come back. Down 4-1 with 8 minutes left and with Sexsmith pulled for an extra attacker they scored!! Can't say enough about these Giants. They outshot the Cats 49 - 16 during regulation 5-1 in OT


1st Period
pg Robertson (20 sec)
pg Hunter

2nd Period
Franson - Blum /Watt

3rd Period

PG Redden
PG Saegart
Lamb - Bliznak
Kraus - Franson /Blum
Bliznak - Mikellsen

Shoot out ( 5th shooter JD Watt scores and Sexsmith saves PG shooter for the win!!!!!

[Jimmy]

OMG

I turned it off at 4-1 and came to terms with the first loss...
Then checked the WHL site for the three stars and it was 4-4 :bounce:

That's why you are CHL#1

[C.F]

WHAT?

This reminds me of last years game vs the Broncos. What else can be said, the Giants are an inspiring team!

[Tiger Trauma]

Wow thats quite the comback

I turned off the webcast with about 10 minutes left to watch LOST on tv. Guess i missed the best part of the game

[PGFlyfisher]

The Cougars played really well in the first. I don' t think the Giants brought their "A" game for the first 20 though,
but then they woke up in the second and pretty much dominated from there on.
Cyr was definitely a huge factor in the single point. 50+ shots!
Cougars get into penalty trouble late in the game that pretty much does it.
No team can afford to take even one shift off against the Giants. They are impressive to watch!
Hope the Cougars can pull one out of the 3 game mini series.

[Beaner]

Amazing comeback.

I only listened to the game tonight but by the sounds of it, Vancouver dominated the 2nd/3rd, and with a few bad penalties by the COugars at the end managed to tie it up.

Cyr sounded amazing tonight.

13 wins in a row including preseason.

[dondo]

I only listened to it too, but Joey and Bill Wilms gave some great visuals so here's the recap

enjoy.




Giants Claw Back The Cougars
Vancouver 5 Prince George 4 (SO)

After being named the top team from last week in the CHL, the Giants took their unbeaten streak of this young season up to Prince George. The Vancouver squad handily defeated the re-vamped PG squad at the Coliseum this past Sunday 4-1 and they knew they were in for a harder time of it at the CN Centre tonight. They were right as the PG squad came out to an early lead which they held and then padded in the third period before the Giants made an amazing come-back in the final five minutes of the game to force OT. A nail biter of a shoot-out made the come-back complete as Cody Franson and JD Watt scored in sudden death shooters to edge the Prince George squad, give Don Hay his 300th WHL career head coach victory and extend their winning streak to 6 games.

The Prince George team is looking more like contenders after picking up Devin Setogutchi from the Saskatoon Blades. A first round pick of the San Jose Sharks, Setogutchi was acquired for the rights to PG’s first round bantam pick this past draft, and PG’s 2008 first round pick. Setogutchi will not be in the Cougar line-up until at least Friday and possibly not until Tuesday the 10th.

The game opened with a fight between Garet Hunt and Dana Tyrell off the drop of the puck 2 seconds into the game. Hunt was held at bay for the first part of the battle but managed to get inside and get a few good shots in before both players went to the ice. Call it a draw. The Cougars opened the scoring not long after that (21secs later in fact) when Jared Walker fed, CHL player of the week last week, Brett Robertson who got the puck past Tyson Sexsmith. The PG squad padded their lead on their first PP of the game at 7:13 as Kalvin Sagert fed, Nick Drazenovic, who took a quick shot on Sexsmith who kicked the rebound to the open where a wily Eric Hunter was waiting to pounce and buried the puck into the open net. The Giants out-shot the Cougars in the first but Real Cyr was showing why he deserved to start for the Cats this season, robbing a couple of G-Men on the doorstep and preserving his team’s two goal advantage.

Although the Giants lacked their trade-mark tenacity in the second period they did not lack for shots on Cyr. Neither team were able to maintain a sustained forecheck in the second period, but each had decent forays into the opposing zone. The Giants out-shot the Cougars 18 – 5 in the middle stanza, but Real Cyr stood tall and turned away all 18 shots. The Giants began to play a bit more of their game later in the second but Cyr turned away a flurry of PP opportunities to keep his team up in the game. However, the Giants finally broke the ice at 16:29 of the second, when Cody Franson managed to sneak through a short-side shot on Cyr.

The Giants opened the third with intensity and were skating hard in the period but Cyr continued to stymie the G- Men thwarting more than few odd man rushes. It felt like the Giants were slowing losing some of that momentum as the Prince George goaltender seemed almost impenetrable. As often happens when a goalie stands on his head the ice started to slide the other way. Taking advantage of a PP opportunity Lance Redden tallied his first of the season and first in the WHL (I believe), off a nice feed from behind the blue-line. The Cats put what should have been the final nail of the coffin in the game 1:20 later, when Kalvin Sagert bounced a puck off a Giant body in front of Sexsmith putting the Cougars up by three with 7:34 to go in the game. The Giants did not sag and did not give up and took their best game into the Cougar zone drawing a series of penalties upon which they capitalised. At 16:06 Kyle Lamb started the come-back, and then at 17:57 Tim Kraus re-deflected a Cody Franson shot past Cyr to draw the G-Men within one. Then at 18:43, with a 6 on 4 advantage due to Sexsmith sitting on the bench, Mario Bliznak capped the come-back scoring the tying goal and knotting up the game at fours. The Giants even looked dangerous in those final seconds but the game went to OT.

In OT the Giants continued to press and it was only Real Cyr who kept the Vancouver team from scoring in the extra stanza. The G-men out-shot the Cougar team 5-1 in bonus time, but the game went to a shoot-out in the end. The Giants began with a hot hand of late Jason Reese who missed the net with the back-hand. Dana Tyrell missed for the Cougs. Michal Repik made a nice fore to back only to have the puck roll off his stick. Nick Drazenovic made it interesting slipping the puck past Sexsmith. Cody Franson then opted to shoot instead of deke and beat Cyr high glove-side to keep the G-Men in the game. Jonothan Blum missed a high shot. Eric Hunter and Brett Robertson both missed their shots to keep the shootout tied. JD Watt got the puck past Cyr, and Jared Walker was stoned by Sexsmith for the win, capping a crazy come-back and sending dejected Prince George fans to the streets . Out of three starts Sexsmith has won two of them in shootouts, and now has a 3-0 record.

The Giants out shot the Cougars 53 - 17, and tallied 3 for 10 on the PP to the Cats 2 for 6. The Giants showed huge heart and determination to come-back in tonight’s game which is an object lesson that it truly is never over until the final buzzer. The Giants seemed to have served notice that they intend to be a Don Hay team to the end, that they are going to earn their way into the Memorial Cup and any team who wants to take them down have got to be at the top of their game. The two teams meet again back on the ice at the CN Centre on Friday night. Puck drops at 7 pm and it should be a good one as the Cougars will be very eager to prove to their fans that they are contenders.

Three Stars
1 – Real Cyr
2 – Nick Drazenovic
3 – Cody Franson

[N.W. Bruin]

Amazing comeback.

I only listened to the game tonight but by the sounds of it, Vancouver dominated the 2nd/3rd, and with a few bad penalties by the COugars at the end managed to tie it up.

Cyr sounded amazing tonight.

13 wins in a row including preseason.

Should be a interesting rematch on Friday. And with the day off the usual split by teams in Prince George which usually happens on a Friday/Saturday matchup maybe will not be a factor.

[bones]

What an absolute DELETED joke the tying goal was. Mahacek knocks down the puck with a blatant high stick that somehow the refs and linesmen miss which leads to the tying goal seconds after (sounds like the playoffs game 4 last year when the Giants get away with another blatant no call when somehow I believe it was Mahacek slashed Wisharts stick in half behind the net in front of the ref which seconds later lead to the tying goal, allowing Van to win in ot). As well as a terrible no call when the Giants had 12 guys on the ice and played the puck at their bench, just DELETED. The Giants were lucky to get away with this win because Sexsmith was terrible, the 3rd and 4th goals were floaters from the blueline. Besides that it was pretty back and forth until the last half of the 3rd when PG ran into penalty trouble. Once PG can put together a healthy line up then we will see whos really the better team.

[Kassian]

Somebody's a bit cranky. :p

Prince George deserved to lose the game because after the 1st intermission they didn't show up for the next 40 minutes. While the Giants were pretty slow out of the gate, they showed up when it really mattered. Make all the excuses you want, the Giants are without a doubt a better team.

[amisk]

Best Game I ever watched on radio...Congrats you G-men.

[rinkrat]

What an absolute ****ing joke the tying goal was. Mahacek knocks down the puck with a blatant high stick that somehow the refs and linesmen miss which leads to the tying goal seconds after (sounds like the playoffs game 4 last year when the Giants get away with another blatant no call when somehow I believe it was Mahacek slashed Wisharts stick in half behind the net in front of the ref which seconds later lead to the tying goal, allowing Van to win in ot). As well as a terrible no call when the Giants had 12 guys on the ice and played the puck at their bench, just ****ing retarded. The Giants were lucky to get away with this win because Sexsmith was terrible, the 3rd and 4th goals were floaters from the blueline. Besides that it was pretty back and forth until the last half of the 3rd when PG ran into penalty trouble. Once PG can put together a healthy line up then we will see whos really the better team.

FYI,the game was broadcast on the internet. :D

[Sput]

I will have to agree that the Giants 'deserved' the win tonight/last night (whatever). The Cats only showed up in the first period, and the Giants wore them down. Bones is right though, there was 10-12 Giants on the ice at one point, playing the puck at the bench and no call. I think there were more white jerseys on the ice than on the bench for about 5 seconds. The penalties that resulted in the 5 on 3 was questionable. I'll give them the high stick on Sagart, but it was a phantom slash on Mihalik that gave the 5 on 3. No one in my section saw it, and most of the players (even the Giants) were wondering who the penalty was on.

Give Vancouver full marks though. They never quit playing, never stopped shooting. Hay must have read the riot act in the dressing room after the first, because they came back out hard. Cyr was outstanding. Ashame they couldn't take advantage of his awsome performance and take two points. Shapes up for a great game friday night.

[TheBrass]

All I can say is WOW!!! I very nearly had a Tom Cruise moment jumping up and down on the couch.............I LOVE THE GIANTS :clap:

[dondo]

well I think Rehman was his usual self calling stupid stuff and letting other stuff go (his biggest problem isn't what he calls but his colossal lack of consistency -- you never know what will or won't be called - which for me is far worse than just making poor calls) -- so I can understand why bones is choked. Now there's a guy with small man syndrome (Rehman i mean -- I don't know how big bones is :D ). I think he called stupidity on both sides of the puck though -- diving on Festerling? (i don't think he knows what diving is) and the extra unsportsmanlike on Watt (early on) was simply an ego-thing.

in the end the Cougars tried to sit on their lead and it cost them. Amazing come-back in the end as even you bones have to admit being able to score three goals inside of four minutes is impressive esp when it sounded like Cyr was standing on his freaking head all game .

I trust Friday's game will be a might testy between these two teams.

btw sounded like Dulle had a hell of game -- looks like that car acccident might be behind him. and bones you're right Sexsmith had a few floaters get by him but that fourth goal deflected off of a player in the front, however in the end he's the goalie I want in a shootout.

[Cougar Guy]

This was a weird game. I thought we were very fortunate to be up 4-1 and I also thought that Vancouver was fortunate to get the W if that makes any sense :D

Other than the 1st period and the opening 5 minutes of the 2nd, it was pretty much all Giants. Sexsmith could've finished an entire season of Madden on a PSP if he had one with him in the crease.

Full markes to the Giants for the win. PG was lucky to get a point. But hey, we'll take it and I'm sure the boys will regroup. Seasons aren't decided in early October.

[Hunt24]

What an absolute ****ing joke the tying goal was. Mahacek knocks down the puck with a blatant high stick that somehow the refs and linesmen miss which leads to the tying goal seconds after.

Funny, BCTV has shown that goal twice now on their newscast and all I see is Machacek knock it down at waste level. Unless Spencer is 9"4', that's not a high stick. Sounds like sour grapes to me. I thought Kelowna had world famous wine, but bones, you're giving them a run.



As well as a terrible no call when the Giants had 12 guys on the ice and played the puck at their bench, just ****ing retarded. The Giants were lucky to get away with this win because Sexsmith was terrible, the 3rd and 4th goals were floaters from the blueline. Besides that it was pretty back and forth until the last half of the 3rd when PG ran into penalty trouble. Once PG can put together a healthy line up then we will see whos really the better team.

So the reasons for the PG loss were.

1. You don't have a healthy team.
2. The refereeing was bad.
3. PG ran into penalty trouble.

Funny how those actually sound like excuses, and not reasons. Odd that not once do you mention how well the Giants played in the second and third, only to give a backhanded self compliment, "that it was back and forth" when even your own coach is quoted in the paper today as saying you were badly outplayed in the final two periods.

Bones, your team can put together an excellent team on paper and the addition of Setoguchi is certainly going to help, but until the Cougars show that they're capable of hanging with the #1 team in the country they're only going to be pretenders. And don't forget, it's not "just one game", it's actually two and you guys now are a .500 team.

[Sput]

I don't find it at all surprising that some people are lambasting bones on his comments, and yet I made a post here too, and no one has picked it apart yet. One thing I have found is if it was a terrible loss, for whatever reason, don't post that night. Think about the game, re-hash it all in your mind, and then decide if your team was really that good/bad. I was ready to rant and rave about the reffing, the missed calls, the weak calls, the injuries. I waited until today to post, and came to the conclusion that the Cougs didn't earn it. Cyr might have, but the team didn't.

The Giants played their game last night. No question about it. The Cats did take it to them in the first, got some lucky breaks in the third, but ultimately did not do enough to win. Hopefully losing the way the Cougars did will teach a hard lesson. About three years ago the Giants were in the same boat. Loads of talent on the team, but not a strong tradition of winning, so learning to win was something new for them. Since that time they have found their stride, and know how to win games that appear out of reach late in the third. The Cougars are learning that now. Reffing....can't blame it (as much as everyone does after a loss) because its ALWAYS unpredictable. Injuries....well some say you can't use that as a reason, others say it is. Hard to ice your best team when there are 5 regulars sitting in the stands with some kind of injury. Take 5 of the Giants top players out of the lineup and see how they stack up.

All told the Cats didn't get it done, the Giants never quit. PG was lucky to get a single out of this, but didn't deserve to win. That said....the season isn't decided in October, so we wait and see how the rest of the games go.

[bones]

Funny, BCTV has shown that goal twice now on their newscast and all I see is Machacek knock it down at waste level. Unless Spencer is 9"4', that's not a high stick. Sounds like sour grapes to me. I thought Kelowna had world famous wine, but bones, you're giving them a run.



So the reasons for the PG loss were.

1. You don't have a healthy team.
2. The refereeing was bad.
3. PG ran into penalty trouble.

Funny how those actually sound like excuses, and not reasons. Odd that not once do you mention how well the Giants played in the second and third, only to give a backhanded self compliment, "that it was back and forth" when even your own coach is quoted in the paper today as saying you were badly outplayed in the final two periods.

Bones, your team can put together an excellent team on paper and the addition of Setoguchi is certainly going to help, but until the Cougars show that they're capable of hanging with the #1 team in the country they're only going to be pretenders. And don't forget, it's not "just one game", it's actually two and you guys now are a .500 team.


Gear down big rig, I didnt say the ref was bad. For the most part I agree with the calls he made on both sides, and I can understand him maybe not picking up the high stick or the too many men but the linesmen should at least be able to pick this up if he cant. Like I said Pg ran into penalty trouble in the third and it cost them, didnt blame the ref there did I. Having a healthy team is a huge part of how well youre going to do. I think not having Wishart, a first round draft pick, Dudas, also an NHL pick, as well as Vanduynhoven doesnt quite help your chances. Not to mention Drazenovic and Robertson are playing hurt right now. Now if those guys are healthy and now add in Setoguchi, PG is going to be a much better team thats not going to run out of gas in the 3rd period because they can only roll 2 lines. Id like to see how well the Giants do missing 3 or 4 of their top players and play a PG team thats 100% healthy for a couple of games. Oh and dont forget these two teams have 6 games left against each other to see how they stack up, so dont give me this 0-2 bull****. No need to be so cocky either, just because Van is hosting the Mem Cup doesnt mean they are going to walk away with it already. The season is still early, theres lots of hockey to be played, Im not worried about PG's chances at all, we will see soon enough who the contenders and pretenders are.

[GF71]

OOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH A Showdown!!!
Who is going to cross the line first? ahaha

[rinkrat]

Id like to see how well the Giants do missing 3 or 4 of their top players and play a PG team thats 100% healthy for a couple of games.

You did see that.Last season the Giants played large portions of the season without Brule(NHL) Kraus (broken jaw),Fistric(broken leg/ankle) Mikkelson(blown out knee).Thats off the top of my head,there may well have been more.
The point is,Don Hay refused to let the boys use injuries as an excuse.Rather he rolled four lines all season utilizing the depth of the team and building the younger players confidence for such an occurance.
Regardless we have a great rivalry going here and best of luck to both clubs.Its going to be some great hockey for all fans to watch. :thumb:

[Hunt24]

Gear down big rig, I didnt say the ref was bad.

Actually, you're right. You never used the word "bad". You did however use a few other descriptive words. Let's do this Howie Meeker style, shall we?

Okay, roll the film boys...


somehow the refs and linesmen miss which leads to the tying goal seconds after (sounds like the playoffs game 4 last year when the Giants get away with another blatant no call when somehow I believe it was Mahacek slashed Wisharts stick in half behind the net in front of the ref which seconds later lead to the tying goal, allowing Van to win in ot). As well as a terrible no call when the Giants had 12 guys on the ice and played the puck at their bench, just ****ing retarded.

Now stop it right there

So, retarded was the word you used. My bad.


Id like to see how well the Giants do missing 3 or 4 of their top players and play a PG team thats 100% healthy for a couple of games.

I've got a better idea. How about before the season even starts we agree to go without our top forward and our top defenseman from last season? We'll let them play in the NHL or something. Let's see how we do then. You're right PG is going to get better as guys get back from injury. But don't talk to us about playing without guys.

And, as rinkrat points out, we managed to do okay with our top players for stretches last year.

[KBF]

Funny, BCTV has shown that goal twice now on their newscast and all I see is Machacek knock it down at waste level. Unless Spencer is 9"4', that's not a high stick. Sounds like sour grapes to me. I thought Kelowna had world famous wine, but bones, you're giving them a run.



So the reasons for the PG loss were.

1. You don't have a healthy team.
2. The refereeing was bad.
3. PG ran into penalty trouble.

Funny how those actually sound like excuses, and not reasons. Odd that not once do you mention how well the Giants played in the second and third, only to give a backhanded self compliment, "that it was back and forth" when even your own coach is quoted in the paper today as saying you were badly outplayed in the final two periods.

Bones, your team can put together an excellent team on paper and the addition of Setoguchi is certainly going to help, but until the Cougars show that they're capable of hanging with the #1 team in the country they're only going to be pretenders. And don't forget, it's not "just one game", it's actually two and you guys now are a .500 team.




I think Cougar fans are getting overly cocky about their team. Sure they got some real nice forwards up front and their D is above average, but not in the Giants league as nobody in the BC division is and with the exception of Everett, even in the Western Conference.

Some Cougar fans need to be more modest because has there ever been a succesful season in PG? No, have you had many other talented teams before that fizzled out early? Yes. So again, its nice that the Cougars got Setoguchi because everyone in Vancouver all but had him in a Giants jersey.

[Swando]

What an absolute ****ing joke the tying goal was. Mahacek knocks down the puck with a blatant high stick that somehow the refs and linesmen miss which leads to the tying goal seconds after (sounds like the playoffs game 4 last year when the Giants get away with another blatant no call when somehow I believe it was Mahacek slashed Wisharts stick in half behind the net in front of the ref which seconds later lead to the tying goal, allowing Van to win in ot). As well as a terrible no call when the Giants had 12 guys on the ice and played the puck at their bench, just ****ing retarded. The Giants were lucky to get away with this win because Sexsmith was terrible, the 3rd and 4th goals were floaters from the blueline. Besides that it was pretty back and forth until the last half of the 3rd when PG ran into penalty trouble. Once PG can put together a healthy line up then we will see whos really the better team.


Don't care how bad you think the Giants/Sexsmith was ---and you relive the past as the G-Men inialated the Cats............ folding from a 4-1 lead shows what your team is made of!

[bones]

Don't care how bad you think the Giants/Sexsmith was ---and you relive the past as the G-Men inialated the Cats............ folding from a 4-1 lead shows what your team is made of!

Losing a 4-1 lead shows you that not having 4 regulars in the line up and a couple of banged up guys playing hurts a team.



You did see that.Last season the Giants played large portions of the season without Brule(NHL) Kraus (broken jaw),Fistric(broken leg/ankle) Mikkelson(blown out knee).Thats off the top of my head,there may well have been more.
The point is,Don Hay refused to let the boys use injuries as an excuse.Rather he rolled four lines all season utilizing the depth of the team and building the younger players confidence for such an occurance.

So that was last year, Im talking about this year, and if I remember correctly PG beat the Giants last year when they had those problems. All Im saying is that its going to be different once PG is healthy.

[rinkrat]

Bring on Swift Current. :clap:

[dondo]

Bring on Swift Current. :clap:

erm .. what about tomorrow night's game or are you just blocking that out rinkrat :p :laugh:

in all fairness if that happened to us we'd be pissed off too, esp if our goalie was standing on his head. I like what Sput said and also what Vandekamp said...


"It’s probably good they won in a shootout — they played better than we did and they deserved the extra point, to be honest," said Cougars head coach Mike Vandekamp, steaming over the giveaways and soft plays made by his depleted defence corps. The APB is out for Ty Wishart and Jesse Dudas, the Cats' top injured rearguards, to make speedy recoveries.

"It would’ve been tough to sell it to our guys how much better we need to be if we had snuck two points out of that game," Vandekamp said. "We’re scrambly on the back end right now and they were coming at us in waves. We made soft play after soft play, and when you’re trapped in your own end that long eventually the penalty trouble is going to come just because of the territorial advantage they have.

"Our back end is not a pretty sight right now. I was happy with some of our D, but some of the other guys have to pick up the intensity level." it allows him to teach his team a bit of a lesson here, where-as had they squeaked out the two points it could have done a different kind of damage.

Tomorrow night's going to be a barn-burner

[rinkrat]

erm .. what about tomorrow night's game or are you just blocking that out rinkrat :p :laugh:


ooops,I forgot about Friday. Good luck guys,should be fun to watch.Good luck to our friends in the North. Hope you have a great turn around season,especially with the attendance.

[Beaner]

Ok, I have had to go thru and edit about 5 posts in this thread and delete a bunch of others.

If people cant play nice with each other, I will be forced to lock this thread.

Please keep the comments to the topic at hand, and keep the "your a troll", personal attacks, and spelling and grammer comments to yourselves.


Healthy debate is good, and everyone has a different perspective on what happens during a game. Everyone please show a little a respect for your fellow posters point of view. People are allowed to disagree with each other without it becoming a mudslinging contest.

[rinkrat]

funny it doesn't indicate the posts that were edited..
Mine aren't affected

[Swando]

Ok, I have had to go thru and edit about 5 posts in this thread and delete a bunch of others.

If people cant play nice with each other, I will be forced to lock this thread.

Please keep the comments to the topic at hand, and keep the "your a troll", personal attacks, and spelling and grammer comments to yourselves.


Healthy debate is good, and everyone has a different perspective on what happens during a game. Everyone please show a little a respect for your fellow posters point of view. People are allowed to disagree with each other without it becoming a mudslinging contest.

Sorry Beaner ...he got the better of me.. I'll be more careful in my responses.

[Sput]

ooops,I forgot about Friday. Good luck guys,should be fun to watch.Good luck to our friends in the North. Hope you have a great turn around season,especially with the attendance.

Week night games are a tough sell in any WHL town. We still got almost 2900 out of approximatly 78,000. On any given week night Vancouver doesn't get as many comapred to weekend games.

Something to also take into concideration is the total number of people that work swing shift here (three pulp mills, dozens of sawmills, along with the hospital and what not that everyone else has) and the huge numbers that work in the bush during the week. Thats takes a huge chunk out of the available hockey spectators.