Sniderman a shootout star

By RYAN PYETTE, SUN MEDIA
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When the London Knights picked up over-age goalie Jhase Sniderman off waivers, they were simply looking to fill a gaping hole left after trading away Steve Mason.
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Who knew they would be bringing in the shootout king of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League?
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The 20-year-old goalie turned aside two of three Mississauga attempts and Jadran Beljo buried the shootout winner as the Knights topped the St. Michael’s Majors 3-2 before 8,844 last night at the John Labatt Centre.
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Surging London won its fourth straight game and is 4-2 in shootouts this season.
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Some players and teams dread the shootout. Sniderman thrives on it.
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“When I played for Moncton last year, I was in eight shootouts and had the best record in the league,” he said with a grin.
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The most memorable of those was a marathon Wildcats victory over the Baie-Comeau Drakkar Oct. 25, 2006 that lasted 15 rounds.
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Sniderman stopped 14 of 15 attempts to give his team a 2-1 victory in one of the longest shootouts in hockey history.
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“It was a Quebec league record,” he said. “The guy who won it for us (Nick Emmanuele) had no goals. We almost went through the whole bench.”
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Thanks to Beljo, Sniderman, whose Spiderman nickname has followed him around since his Erie Otters days, didn’t have to play shootout Superman. He stopped Matt Piva and Michael Pelech.
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The only goal he allowed to Majors leading scorer Kaspars Daugavins squeaked over the goal-line and was originally waved off by referee Brad Beer before the call was overturned on video review.
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“I tried to pull the Carey Price move from the world juniors last year (where the now Montreal Canadiens goalie swerved his pads to swallow up ex-Knight Pat Kane’s shootout attempt for the U.S. in a semifinal shootout Canada won),” Sniderman said. “I felt it between my legs and I thought I got it.”
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He sold it well. When it comes to the shootout, he knows what he’s doing. The same goes for Beljo in the offensive zone. The 20-year-old scored his team-leading fourth short-handed goal (and second in two games), assisted on Sean O’Connor’s third-period power-play goal to force overtime and won it in the breakaway standoff.
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“Everyone has their own approach but I like to make the goalie move and shoot the puck,” he said. “I thought we were sloppy in the first two periods. We didn’t play our game and we have to be better than that if we want to keep winning.”
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The Majors franchise, operated by Ottawa Senators owner Eugene Melnyk, has never won at the JLC and has lost six straight in London. Their last victory in this city was on Dec. 7, 2001 at the Ice House a few weeks after Dale Hunter took over the Knights’ head coaching duties from Lindsay Hofford.
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Both teams had glorious chances in OT but Sniderman and the Majors’ Anthony Grieco slammed the door. The Knights had more shots (seven) in the five-minute OT than in the entire third (six).
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London forward Andrew Wilkins returned after missing 13 games with a broken bone in his left foot. The last time he was in uniform on Dec. 9, he limped off in pain to a rousing cheer for blocking consecutive Kitchener shots.
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“I’m not going to change the way I play. I have some extra protection covering the foot so if I have to block another shot, that’s what I’ll do.”
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Forward Phil McRae took the red-eye flight home from Edmonton Wednesday night after the top prospects game. He got into London at 8 a.m.