Twenty-year-old Brett Mirwald had a night he will likely never forget Wednesday, as goalie for the Langley-based Vancouver Giants.
The 6 ft. 1 in. netminder from Saskatoon reported the first shutout of his hockey career, leading the G-Men to a 3-0 victory over the Spokane Chiefs.
The defeat in Washington ranks the Giants eighth in the western conference, improving their record to nine wins and 12 loses in the first 23 games of the regular season.
Mirwald is now ranks third in the Western Hockey League (WHL) in saves with 574. Fourteen of those alone came in the third period of this matchup, and not surprisingly earned him the first star of the game title, said associate coach Adam Maglio.
“He was outstanding, again. It’s kind of surprising it’s his first shutout because of the way he’s played. He’s been on pretty much every game, so it was nice seeing him get that reward tonight. I thought he was really good,” Maglio said, reflecting on the young goalie’s performance.
In the game at the Spokane Veterans Memorial Arena, the Giants blanked the Chiefs, but not without some effort.
Scoring for the Giants was Julian Cull, Aaron Obobaifo, and Adam Titlbach.
Cull opened the scoring for Vancouver just 2:44 into the game, after he made a move to the inside and then cut back outside to his forehand and whacked a shot past Dawson Cowan for his second goal of the season.
With just under five minutes remaining in the opening period, Obobaifo beat everyone to a loose puck just inside the offensive zone and quickly fired a shot past the glove side of Cowan to double Vancouver’s lead to 2-0.
Before the first period came to a close, Titlbach backhanded in a loose puck at the side of the goal off a feed from Kyren Gronick to make it 3-0 Giants after 20 minutes.
The Giants carried their strong play into the second period, but couldn’t add to their lead, despite several good chances.
After 40 minutes, the score remained the same: 3-0 Giants, and they led on the shot clock 25-19.
In the third period, Vancouver faced some adversity when they had to kill off two penalties in the first 10 minutes, but they were up to the task, coming away unscathed.
Maglio commented on the game as a whole.
“I thought it was by committee tonight. I really liked our five-man game on the ice. I thought the guys were committed, especially being up by three goals – I just thought our attention to detail was there tonight for the most part away from the puck. It was nice to see the guys get rewarded,” he shared after the game.
The Giants play again tonight (Friday, Nov. 24) , this time in Kamloops – their second visit to the Sandman Centre this season – where they take on the Blazers – currently the bottom-ranked team in the Western Conference. The last head-to-head was a 3-2 Giants shootout victory on Nov. 4 at Langley Events Centre (LEC).
Then, they return home to the LEC the next day, where they’ll take on the visiting Tri-City Americans. Puck drops at 7 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 25. Tickets are available online by CLICKING HERE.
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