The key word is momentum, which is not something the Bowling Green hockey team possessed going into Friday’s contest with Findlay at the BG Ice Arena. It didn’t help that the Oilers, a team that the Falcons were facing for the first time in school history, took a 3-1 lead going into the third period. However, the momentum shifted as BG scored three unanswered goals in the final 10 and one-half minutes of the game to give the Falcons a 4-3 victory. The win snapped Bowling Green’s five game losing streak.
For Coach Scott Paluch and his squad, this type of situation is all too familiar. In Bowling Green’s game with Western Michigan earlier this season, the Falcons held a 5-3 lead late in the third period. Western Michigan then scored three unanswered goals to win the game 6-5.
The scoring began 2:33 into the first period when Findlay’s Kris Wiebe deflected a centering pass from behind the BG net over the left shoulder of Falcon goaltender Tyler Masters. After Bowling Green forward Mark Wires tied the game up at one with a backhand slap shot on a breakaway, the Oilers scored two more times to take a 3-1 lead after two periods.
The first two periods saw the puck inside the Falcons’ zone a majority of the time. However, a 34-save night for BG goaltender Tyler Masters, including two important sequences in the second period, kept Bowling Green in the game.
“He usually makes that big save, and this time we took advantage of it,” said defenseman Kevin Bieksa, who tallied three assists in the game.
“Tyler’s a very good goalie,” Paluch said. “We’ve had great play out of both of our goaltenders, Tyler and Jordan Sigalet.”
Masters was a wall in the third period, stopping all ten shots that came his way in the third period Midway through that third period, the momentum continued to shift as freshman Brett Pilkington scored his first career goal by sending the rebound of a slapper past Oilers’ goalie Jamie VandeSpyker. Bowling Green tied the game on D’Arcy McConvey’s second goal of the season. Finally, Bowling Green took the lead when Ryan Minnabarriet tipped a slapshot from the air past VandeSpyker with only 1:02 left in regulation. Masters survived a last second onslaught by the Oilers, and Bowling Green won 4-3. The stars of the game were Minnabarriet, Findlay’s Sean Kotary (one goal, one assist), and Bieksa.
“I think we just wanted it more in the third period,” said Bieksa. The Falcons will next face Miami in back-to-back away games this weekend.
