Jefferson Hagen
MacEwan Athletics
EDMONTON – All of the hockey IQ, gumption, grit and mental fortitude necessary to deal with defending the wild, fast-paced offensive attack of the Saskatchewan Huskies eventually took its toll on the Griffins.
Tied 1-1 with the hottest team in the Canada West men's hockey ranks, they were a shot away from ending the Huskies' eight-game winning streak.
That is until the middle stretch of the third period when the visitors brought everything but the kitchen sink into play, relentless in a pursuit that led to two third-period goals in a 3-1 victory.
"They're fast and they put a ton of pressure on you," said MacEwan head coach Zack Dailey. "They continued to push, and we sat back. We turned over too many pucks early in the game, which I think made us gassed at the end of the game because we had to defend more (than we wanted) at the beginning of the game. So, when it was push time, we had defended too much, so we didn't have a lot of jam to push.
"But the guys competed, they didn't quit. I was happy with our effort and certainly really happy with (Brett) Epp's game today."
The MacEwan goaltender stopped 40 of 43 shots – many of those high danger as he stared down breakaways, odd-man rushes and relentless pressure without blinking.
"He was great tonight," said Dailey. "I'm really impressed with him. Obviously, just chatting with him, when he played these guys the first semester it didn't go the way he wanted it to, and he felt off.
"Our whole week, we were ready to go. We felt like we didn't give them our best games, so we just wanted to come out and compete.
"They're rolling, they're a very good hockey team – first place in our division – so we wanted to see where we stack up against them and I thought we did a pretty good job. Epper certainly stood in and gave us a chance to win."
Brett Epp shuts down a partial breakaway from @HuskieMHKY forward Chantz Petruic, making a great blocker stop - one of his 13 saves so far. @MacEwanGriffins trail Saskatchewan 1-0 after 20 minutes.#GriffNation pic.twitter.com/oCWyt3iJth
— MacEwan Griffins Men's Hockey (@GriffinsMHKY) February 1, 2025
It's the Huskies' ninth win in a row as they improved to 19-4-0, remaining even with Alberta – 5-0 winners over Trinity Western – atop the East Division standings, but with two games in hand.
MacEwan drops to 9-12-2 and are now only six points ahead of Manitoba for the final playoff spot in the East Division after the Bisons blanked the Regina Cougars 3-0.
Their magic number to clinch remains three with five games left for both them and the Bisons.
Boasting the best powerplay Canada West has seen in its modern era – clicking at 34.0% entering the contest – Saskatchewan stayed on track to keep that percentage by converting on their third man advantage to open the scoring with 4:31 left in the opening period.
Trevor Wong flung a cross-seam pass to Dawson Holt, who just threw it into a mess of bodies in front of Epp. The right bounce landed on Chantz Petruic's stick and he made no mistake.
Despite being outshot 14-5 in the first period, the Griffins stuck with it and tied the game just 28 seconds into the second period when Logan Dowhaniuk simply threw a puck on net from the left corner and his sharp-angle shot eluded Huskies netminder Roddy Ross, who was down in his RVH.
GOAL��
— MacEwan Griffins Men's Hockey (@GriffinsMHKY) February 1, 2025
Throw it on net and you never know ... Logan Dowhaniuk does just that, tying the game 1-1 with @HuskieMHKY just 28 seconds into the second period!#GriffNation pic.twitter.com/R96cayuGKz
To be fair, that's the only goal that beat Ross on the evening, as he finished with 20 saves and looked sharper as the contest went on. However, he was also bailed out by a quick whistle with 1:49 left in the second period after he stopped Vincent Scott's breakaway, but the puck was never covered before Ethan Sundar's second whack knocked it into the net. Unfortunately for the Griffins, it came a half second after the whistle sounded.
It was the second major break in the game for the Huskies after Josh Pillar – in an effort to avoid running over Epp on a reckless charge at the net midway through the second – left his feet and clipped the Griffins goaltender in the head.
In a lucky break, he was only assessed a two-minute goaltender interference penalty. Epp laid on the ice for a bit but eventually shook it off.
Brett Epp makes one of his 40 saves on Friday (Derek Harback photo).
In the third, though, the Huskies made their own breaks and bounces, hemming the Griffins in their own zone for large swaths of time.
Yes, they had a lot of blocked shots and more saves from Epp, but eventually Saskatchewan prevailed, getting goals by Ty Prefontaine at 6:39 – a one-timer from the high slot – and Ethan Regnier at 15:21 – a one-timer from an impossibly sharp angle off an odd-man rush – to end it.
"A good game by them," said Dailey. "But our D zone is kind of designed where we're going to give up point shots. We did – more than I would have liked – for sure, but I think that we did a decent job against a really, really good hockey team.
"We missed a couple chances and missed a couple plays, but overall, I was very happy with our effort."
The teams will meet again on Saturday (5 p.m., Downtown Community Arena, Canada West TV).
