Friday night in Kennewick, Washington, Vancouver Giants secured a 3-2 victory over the Tri-City Americans.
The victory moved the Giants four points clear of Spokane and Prince George for sixth place in the Western Conference playoff standings.
During the match, Jaden Lipinski struck twice for the Giants, and Fabian Lysell broke up a 2-2 tie with his team-leading 19th goal of the season with 1:52 remaining in the third period. Samuel Huo had both goals in response to Tri-City. Giants goaltender Will Gurski made 26 saves to earn the win while Tomas Suchanek stopped 38 for Tri-City.
Vancouver’s Lipinski opened the scoring off a Cole Shepard rebound in the first period at 5:23. For Lipinski, it was his third goal in a span of four games. Ethan Semeniuk earned the second assist.
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Cole Shepard extended his point streak to six straight games. In that span, he’s got three goals and four assists. Huo tied the score on a power play for Tri-City with 1.7 seconds left in the period. Gurski made a sequence of saves, but the third rebound popped to Huo, who made no mistake.
Rhett Melnyk and Marc Lajoie both factored in with assists.
Huo struck again for Tri-City at 3:05 off the rush in the second period. His initial shot was stopped by Will Gurski, but the rebound bounced off a Giants defender and into the net.
Huo’s 24th was set up by Parker Bell. At 17:04, Lipinski struck for his second goal of the night. He also recorded the first multi-goal game of his young WHL career.
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Kaden Kohle forced a turnover at the Tri-City blueilne, and Lipinski took the pass, spun off a check and fired his shot up high and in. Spectators got to witness a Vancouver-dominated third period.
With only 1:52 left on the clock, the Vancouver Giants nabbed the game’s final goal. Fabian Lysell skated onto an Adam Hall pass in the slot, skated in close and tucked his team-leading 19th goal of the season to give the Giants the victory.
With that hit, Lysell also notched his third game-winning goal of the season.
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Vancouver Giants secured a 3-2 victory over the Tri-City Americans on Friday night in Kennewick, Washington. The win moved the Giants to sixth place in the Western Conference playoff standings. (Doug Love/Special to Langley Advance Times)
