After back-stopping his team to a pair of victories, goaltender Harry Fredeman was named the B.C. Intercollegiate Hockey League player of the week.
Fredeman led the Trinity Western Spartans men’s hockey team to back-to-back victories over the Simon Fraser Clan, a 6-5 overtime shootout win and a 4-2 victory.
Fredeman came on with his team trailing 3-1 in the first game and made 32 saves and then played the full game the next day, stopping another 44 shots.
The first game was played at the Langley Events Centre on Feb. 15 with Chris Hirano scoring the lone goal in the six-round shootout to lift the Spartans to victory.
It was just the second time since 2010 that Trinity Western had defeated SFU.
With the Spartans trailing 3-1 — Mattias Schmitt had the lone goal — Fredeman replaced Tim Zwiers in goal and that seemed to spark the team with Jake Harcoff cutting the lead prior to the first intermission and then Schmitt scored his second just 27 seconds into the middle frame.
Matt Ius gave TWU its first lead, but that was quickly negated by Kale Wild scoring on the power play. However, Ius’ second of the period gave the home side a 5-4 lead heading into intermission.
The Clan scored the lone goal in the third forcing overtime which set up Hirano’s heroics after neither team scored in the extra session.
The Spartans completed the home-and-home sweep with a 4-2 win on Feb. 16 at the Bill Copeland Arena in Burnaby.
TWU won despite being outshot 46-27.
“Harry stood on his head, but to our team’s credit, everybody battled hard tonight,” said coach Dwayne Lowdermilk.
“We played a disciplined system and for the second game in a row, reaped the benefits.”
The Spartans raced out to a 3-1 lead after 20 minutes with Cody Stephenson, Matt Chaput and Ius all finding the back of the net.
Josh Stephenson had the final TWU goal, which came in the second period.
The only Clan players to beat Fredeman were Chris Hoe and Tony Oak.
The Spartans are on the road on Feb. 23 in Kamloops when they face the Thompson Rivers WolfPack.
TWU (6-14-0-1) sits four points back of the final playoff spot in the BCIHL. The team does have one game in hand but only has three games remaining in the regular season.
