Hitmen continue dominance over T-Birds
The Calgary Hitmen remain perfect at the ShoWare Center.
Matteo Gennaro had a goal and two assists, including his 100th career Western Hockey League point, and Cody Porter made 27 saves in a first star performance as the Hitmen opened a season-high six-game road trip with a hard-earned 3-1 victory over the Seattle Thunderbirds tonight in Kent, Washington.
Beck Malenstyn and Jakob Stukel also scored for the visiting Hitmen, who are 4-0-1 in their last five games and, even more impressively, have not suffered a setback while visiting the T-Birds since Oct. 26, 2002.
Ethan Bear replied with Seattle’s lone marker.
“We had to grind this one out,” said Hitmen leading scorer Gennaro. “It was far from our best effort, and they took it to us at times, but we’ll certainly take the two points to start this road trip and hopefully improve each time out.”
After nearly 40 minutes of chippy, scoreless hockey, Malenstyn put the Hitmen on the board first after redirecting a Gennaro point shot while on the power play with only eight seconds remaining in the second frame.
For the Winnipeg Jets prospect, Gennaro, the helper was his 100th career point.
“It’s a milestone that I can be proud of, but honestly I don’t feel like I played that well tonight,” Gennaro said. “It was one of those games where my legs weren’t there, so I just tried to get pucks on net and was able to get some bounces.”
Stukel, from Gennaro and Aaron Hyman, extended Calgary’s lead to 2-0 less than three minutes into the third period when the speedy winger pounced on a turnover deep in the Seattle zone before burying his fifth marker of the campaign. Stukel’s eventual game-winner came on only Calgary’s 10th shot of the contest.
With Seattle electing to pull netminder Rylan Toth for an extra-attacker, Bear made it a one-goal game with exactly three minutes remaining in regulation with a point shot that eluded Porter high glove.
For the T-Birds, that was it, that was all.
“I’ve never seen Ports play that well,” Gennaro said. “There were a fury of shots on some shifts, but he stayed calm and focused all night. He is definitely the biggest reason why we’re walking out of here with two points tonight.”
Gennaro, with his fourth goal of the season, rounded out the scoring with an empty-net tally with 1:01 left on the clock.
Calgary went 1 for 3 on the power play and held Seattle scoreless on five opportunities.
This was only the first of six stops over a nine-day span for Calgary, which includes visits to all five U.S. Division teams.
Next up for the Hitmen (7-5-2-0) is the Portland Winterhawks (8-12-0-0) tomorrow night. Game time at the Moda Center is 8 p.m. MT.
