This week in the Atlantic University Hockey Conference we saw a little of the parity return that we haven't been seeing of late as the top two teams won both of their games, the bottom two teams lost both of their games, and the other four teams split their weekend games.
Friday night the UNB Varsity Reds were in the Nova Scotia capital to play the slumping Dalhousie Tigers, who had their star recruit, Mathieu Melanson (Shediac, NB) of the Memorial Cup champion Quebec Remparts, quit the team on Monday. Due to the continuing injury of rookie goaltender Josh Disher (Burlington, ON) the Tigers borrowed goalie and Dalhousie student Christopher Wall (Halifax, NS) from the Junior A Halifax Wolverines. Wall had his first practice with the team Wednesday and was thrown to the wolves when he started in nets Friday. The wounded Tigers showed their mettle in the first period as they out-chanced the V-Reds and UNB was ahead 2-0 only thanks to the fine stops of Michael Ouzas (Hamilton, ON). At 3:44 of the second period Chad McCaffrey (Kitchener, ON) brought the Tigers within one goal and put a scare into UNB ... that lasted just over four minutes until Ouzas made a huge save off the Tiger rush and got the puck to Brad Efthimiou (Mississauga, ON) who went coast to coast and then stuffed the puck between the wickets of Wall. You could see the Tigers sag after that and UNB scored a powerplay goal later in the period and another in the third period. Dal's Jeff Larsh (Bowmanville, ON) scored a powerplay goal with five seconds left in the game, but this one was over back in the second period.
Back in Fredericton, the STU Tommies were having their way with the Acadia Axemen, scoring four goals in the second period and two goals in the third period before Acadia ruined rookie Matt Davis's (Harvey, NB) potential second shutout in a row with a David Victor (The Pas, MB) goal at 11:17 of the final frame. STU captain Kyle McAllister (Cornwall, ON) had two goals and the Turner brothers, Sean and Ian (Belleville, ON), each had a goal.
In Charlottetown, the UPEI Panthers jumped to an early lead thanks to a powerplay goal from Aaron Dawson (Peoria, IL) but Saint Marys' Husky Marc Rancourt (Gloucester, ON) scored the tying goal early in the second period and the insurance goal in the third period as SMU skated to the 3-1 victory. UPEI's Paul Drew (Merlin, ON) made 35 saves in the game where the Panthers were outshot by a two to one margin.
In Antigonish the StFX X-Men took the first period off (according to coach Brad Peddle), and that cost them as the UdeM Aigles Bleus scored three first period goals and held on for the 4-3 win, extending X's losing streak to six games.
Saturday night SMU (pronounced smew) was in Fredericton to play STU (pronounced stew) and once again the Tommies got off to a good start, scoring three goals in the first five minutes of the first period. The Huskies started trading goals with Tommies in the second period but STU held on for the 5-3 win and their eighth consecutive victory. Rookie Justin Bowers (Fredericton, NB) had two goals while Killer-B linemates Jeffrey Bateman (Belleville, ON) and Jean Borbeau (Bonnyville, AB) had three assists and one assist respectively on the night.
In Antigonish the X-Men were outplayed again in the first period as well as the second period; this time by the high-flying Varsity Reds who had a 3-1 lead and a 27-15 shot margin after 40 minutes. UNB came back to ground in the third period as StFX took the body and counter-attacked the UNB rushes. Gritty veteran X-Man Michael Smith (Hamilton, ON) tied the game at 9:05 of the third period, but their lead lasted only 52 seconds until V-Red Rob Hennigar (Jordan, ON) scored from the point on the powerplay. Not to be outdone, Stuart MacRae (Coxheath, NS) scored on the rush to tie it once again at 14:12. The game went deep into overtime and it looked like a shootout loomed until defenceman Sam Roberts (Ottawa,O