On a night when three blue chip freshmen made their Lakehead Thunderwolves debuts, it was a fifth-year senior who made the biggest impact on the stat sheet. Scott Dobben scored three goals to pace a 6-3 Thunderwolves win over the Manitoba Bison on the first night of the TbayTel Varsity Cup Challenge, Tuesday night at the Fort William Gardens in Thunder Bay.
The CIS No. 10 Wolves got goals from two of their new faces as Ryan McDonald and Matt Dias scored their first markers in Lakehead uniforms Dias coming on a second period penalty shot while Mitch Maunu added an empty-netter.
The CIS No. 7 Bisons got tallies from Kyle Howarth, Greg Beller and Mike Hellyer in the loss.
Lakehead had their backs against the wall early when they faced their first penalty kill just seconds into the first period. Dobben quickly zapped the momentum away from Manitoba as he turned an aggressive forecheck into a beautiful backhanded goal 56 seconds in to put LU ahead. After Kyle Howarth scored from the Bisons nearly three minutes later, Dobben potted his second of the night at 5:40.
At the first intermission, Lakehead led 3-2 after McDonald added his goal, with Beller countering for Manitoba.
The second period featured more defensive play with Dias marker standing as the lone goal in the stanza.
Dobben got the hat-trick off a feed from Victor Anilane at 9:37 of the third period while the Bisons kept things interesting when Hellyer scored at 13:25, assisted by Ian Duval and Rick Wood before the Wolves Maunu closed scoring with his empty-netter with under a minute remaining.
Freshman goalie Alex Dupuis got the win for the Thunderwolves who capped a great night for Thunder Bay hockey teams.
Earlier in the evening, the Thunder Bay Midget Kings earned a hard-fought comeback win, 6-5 over the visiting Lansing Capital Center Pride after rallying off three unanswered goals in the final five minutes of the game.
The Kings Todd Skirving scored the tying and game-winning goals as his team overcame a speedy Pride squad that got two goals from both Chris Thomas and Brandon Flood. Blake Damerow also scored for Lansing.
The Kings other markers came courtesy of Tyler Anton, Taylor Santorelli, Matt Kaarela, and Justin Veltri.
The Kings will look to sweep the Pride, Wednesday afternoon at 4:00 p.m. while Lakehead will be back on the ice against the Bisons at 7:30 p.m.