RECAP: Titlbach Hat-Trick Leads Way as G-Men Top Hawks 5-2

Category: ArticleDecember 8, 2024

Portland, OR – The Vancouver Giants got a combined 10 points from Adam Titlbach, Connor Levis and Tyler Thorpe in a 5-2 win over the Portland Winterhawks on Sunday evening to spoil the Hawks Teddy Bear Toss.

The win means the Giants earned four of a possible six points in their 3-in-3 over the weekend. Their record improves to 13-11-4 this season, while the Winterhawks fall to 14-12-2.

Titlbach led the way offensively for Vancouver with a hat-trick – the first of his Western Hockey League career. Levis had a goal and two assists, while Thorpe had four assists. Marek Howell also scored for the Giants, his first goal since coming over in a trade from Moose Jaw in the summer of 2023.

Burke Hood delivered another knockout performance on the road for the G-Men, stopping 34 of 36 shots to improve to 5-4-3 this season. The Brandon, Man. native stopped 64 of 68 shots over two starts on the weekend, for a .941 save percentage.

Diego Buttazzoni and Kyle McDonough provided the goals for Portland.

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GAME SUMMARY

For the third game in a row, the Giants opened the scoring, this time when Levis shovelled home a rebound on the backhand under the pad of goaltender Ondrej Štěbeták at the 9:58 mark of the first period,

Vancouver maintained that one-goal lead through 20 minutes.

Just over six minutes into the second period, Howell extended Vancouver’s lead to two, when he took a drop pass from Jaden Lipinski during 4-on-4 play and snapped it home for his first of the season and first in a Giants uniform.

The Teddy Bear goal finally came for the home side a few minutes later, when Buttazzoni one-timed a shot from the right point right off a face-off five seconds into a power play to make it 2-1 with 9:38 remaining in the second period.

After clean up was complete, Vancouver got right back to their game.

First, Lipinski drew a holding the stick penalty and the ensuing power play, Thorpe zipped a perfect saucer pass backdoor to Titlbach who one-timed it to the back of the net to give the Giants a 3-1 lead.

Before the period was done, Thorpe, Levis and Tiltbach connected on a three-way passing play that was finished off by a one-timer from Titlbach to make it 4-1.

The Hawks got one goal back in third courtesy of McDonough, but that was as close as they’d come, as Titlbach completed the hat-trick by scoring on a breakaway into the empty net, with Thorpe getting his fourth assist of the game on the goal.

STATISTICS

SOG: VAN — 10/15/15 = 40 | POR – 14/14/8 = 36
PP: VAN—2/3 | POR — 3/5
Face-Offs: VAN — 34 | POR — 34

THEY SAID IT

“It was great to see Levis’ line – obviously I thought they had a really strong game. Titlbach – it was great to see him score three tonight and then I thought Thorpe was outstanding tonight. I thought the whole line was. It was a great performance from them…When that line is connected and they’re working together, they’re really really effective and you can see that. Some nice quick, short little plays and before you know it, they’re right around the net and it’s going in. So there is chemistry building and like I said, I thought they were all around it tonight.” – Giants Associate Coach Adam Maglio on Levis, Titlbach & Thorpe as a line

“I thought we skated tonight. There was no resting and like we talked about last night, we were consistent with our effort. It was through the whole 60 minutes. That’s a big key against this Portland team because they come at you in waves. I thought our consistency through all our lines, all our D and our goaltending was great.” – Giants Associate Coach Adam Maglio on the game

“[Hood] was great. I think tonight he built off his game on Friday in Tri-Cities. What we recognized is it was a big crowd in Tri and he didn’t get rattled. He stayed composed, so we had a lot of confidence in him tonight in front of a pretty sold out building here and a lot of fans, that he was going to be composed and what we needed, and he certainly was.” – Giants Associate Coach Adam Maglio on Hood’s performance

3 STARS

1st: POR – Diego Buttazzoni – 1G, 4 SOG, -1
2nd: VAN – Connor Levis – 1G, 2A, 2 SOG, +2
3rd: POR – Kyle McDonough – 1G, 2 SOG

GOALTENDING BATTLE

Vancouver: WIN – Burke Hood (34 saves / 36 shots)
Portland: LOSS – Ondrej Štěbeták (35 saves / 39 shots)

THIS AND THAT

Levis collected career point number 200 with his first period goal. He now has 202 career points (85G-117A) in 249 games
Titlbach’s hat-trick performance was his first multi-goal game as a Giant. He has 12 goals on the season, already more than the nine he scored as a rookie last season in 66 games
Thorpe’s four assists are a new career high, beating his previous best of three, set on Dec. 2, 2023 at TC
Howell’s goal was his first in 88 games as a Giant, after being acquired from Moose Jaw in July of 2023

UPCOMING

Date	Opponent	Time	Location
Friday, December 13	Victoria	7:05 PM PST	Save on Foods Memorial Arena
Saturday, December 14	Victoria	7:00 PM PST	Langley Events Centre
Sunday, December 15	Tri-City	4:00 PM PST	Langley Events Centre

B.C. Division