There were no goals allowed at last night’s senior B Nanaimo Timbermen game.
Re/Max Timbermen goalie Danny Walters accomplished an extremely rare feat in box lacrosse – a shutout.
Walters made 24 saves as Nanaimo defeated the Valley Rebels 18-0 in West Coast Senior Lacrosse Association action Saturday at Frank Crane Arena.
The Rebels were short-manned, but “we stuck to our game plan and still ran our systems and obviously played really well and the score kind of indicated that,” Walters said.
The score was 7-0 after one period and 14-0 after two and at some point the T-men began to shift their focus from goal scoring.
Shawn Swanson, Timbermen general manager, said veteran Aaron Vanderhorst asked the guys, “‘Are we worried about our 16th goal or are we worried about their first?’ and it kind of put it into perspective that it doesn’t matter how many goals we score at this point, it’s can we get Danny that elusive shutout that’s very rare in lacrosse?”
Swanson said especially in the second period there were some breakdowns in which Walters stood tall.
“We just weren’t transitioning well and they got a couple fast breaks or two-on-ones or whatnot. So it wasn’t a cakewalk for him,” the GM said. “He had to make some good saves to earn that.”
Walters said there were some nervous moments near the end as he was aware he had a shutout on the line and was hoping to hang on.
“The defence obviously played awesome in front of me. We were just trying to kill some shot clock and trying to run the time down a bit on our offensive possessions,” he said.
Swanson said when the buzzer went, there was a bit more of a celebration that would normally happen after a blowout win. No one from the organization can recall a Timbermen goalie ever recording a shutout. WCSLA game-by-game stats go back as far as 2007, and there hadn’t been any shutouts in the league since 2008 and none involving the T-men.
“I’ve watched a lot of lacrosse in my life and Timbermen games … I’ve never seen a shutout,” Walters said. “I’m sure there might have been one, but I don’t recall one. So it was pretty cool.”
Joey Fendick led Nanaimo with four goals and two assists and Darrin Wilson and Sam Postma each had two goals and four assists. Doug Langlois, Jon Diplock and Corey Shires also scored two goals each and other scorers were Cayle Ratcliff, Bryson Weberg, Shane Chalker and Bobby Debrone. Final shots were 70-24 in favour of the home team.
GAME ON … The Re/Max Timbermen visit the Victoria Wolves on Friday, June 1 and then host the Langley Warriors on Sunday, June 3 at 5 p.m. at Frank Crane Arena.
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