A defeat on home ice Sunday afternoon has not dislodge the Langley-based Vancouver Giants from its fifth place standings in the Western Conference.
And it didn’t prevent the team’s 20-year-old netminder Brett Mirwald from being crowned goaltender of the week, again – for the fifth time this season.
The moment we've all been waiting for.
— X - Vancouver Giants (@WHLGiants) March 17, 2024
This 16-year-old kid named Cameron Schmidt has 3️⃣0️⃣th of the season!!#GiantNewEra https://t.co/w9UjGxa37L pic.twitter.com/EyVf0Yklq3
The Giants lost what head coach Manny Viveiros called a hard-fought game to the first-place Prince George Cougars on St. Patrick’s Day, March 17. The Cougars pulled away in the third to grab a 6-3 win over the Giants.
“I thought we played – for the better part of this game – really, really good. I was very happy the way we played in stretches where we stuck to the game plan exactly what we needed to do against Prince George,” Viveiros recounted.
“And then all of a sudden the discipline part, it wasn’t the penalty part – it was freebies. Four [Prince George] goals were on odd-man rushes. I don’t know what our D were doing tonight – I think maybe they were taking Bobby Orr pills before the game because they were up ice on the wrong side of the puck. You want your defencemen up the ice, we encourage it too, but if there’s a turnover you’ve got to make sure you’re back in position too. Not just our defence, but a couple other mistakes that we made too,” he shared immediately following the game.
The Giants’ line of Jaden Lipinski, Ty Halaburda, and Cameron Schmidt continued their strong play on Sunday. The trio provided all the offence, with Lipinski scoring twice (including once shorthanded), Schmidt burying his 30th of the season and Halaburda registering three assists.
Meanwhile, goalie Matthew Hutchison stopped 29 of 34 shots in the Giants net.
Despite falling to the Cougars, Viveiros said he was happy with the weekend.
“We got two out of three. We played really good for the most part tonight against a real good hockey team, but still we’re not satisfied with moral victories at this time. We know where we are as a group. I love the way our group is, but we’ve got more. Sometimes it’s not skill set more, or work ethic – we’ve got that – it’s being able to think the game in tough situations too.”
As the coach alluded to, Sunday’s defeat followed two back-to-back victories over the Kamloops Blazers.
In Game 64 of the regular season, the Giants hosted the Blazers at home at Langley Events Centre (LEC) on Friday, March 15, earning a 3-1 victory.
The next night, they had a rematch in Kamloops, where the G-Men again emerged triumphant, this time by the score of 9-2.
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With 32 wins in 66 games so far this season, the Giants hold an overall record of 32-30-4-0 (68 points), which places them two points behind the fourth-place Wenatchee Wild.
Next up, the Giants face off against the Kelowna Rockets, who are only one point behind in the standings. The two adversaries compete twice this coming weekend to close out their regular season.
The G-Men play at home at LEC on Friday, March 22, then are off to Kelowna for a Saturday night season final game against the Rockets. Tickets for the last home game are available online.
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Goalie of the week again
This marks the fifth time Mirwald has earned the Giuseppe WHL goaltender of the week award this season.
He led all WHL goaltenders with a 3-0-0-0 record, a 1.34 goals-against average and a .956 save percentage.
Mirwald kicked off the week with a 24-save performance against the Tri-City Americans, allowing only one goal on the powerplay.
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He got the call to the crease again in Kamloops on Friday, March 15. The Saskatoon product steered aside an early barrage of shots, but Blazers forward Max Sullivan found the opening goal off a two-on-one rush.
It was all Kamloops would get as Mirwald turned aside the other 33 shots he faced, including an Emmitt Finnie breakaway opportunity with the game tied 1-1 in the third period. Mirwald was named first star of the night as the Giants snagged a 3-1 victory.
Mirwald closed out his week by making back-to-back starts against Kamloops. His second effort saw him stop 30 of 32 attempts, beaten only by a Blazers powerplay marker and a three-on-one. This marked the 31st game this season where Mirwald stopped 30 shots or more.
The 6-foot-1, 180-pound netminder now carries a 29-20-3-0 record this season and is 18-5-2 since Jan. 1.
His 29 victories are tied for the second-most among WHL goaltenders.
Mirwald has shaved his goals-against average down to 3.05 while cranking his save percentage to .914, which ranks fourth in the league. He continues to lead the league in saves (1,652) and has played the second-most minutes (3,073).
Mirwald was selected by Moose Jaw in the seventh round, 154th overall, in the 2018 WHL prospects draft before being acquired by Vancouver prior to the 2021-22 season in exchange for a conditional sixth-round pick in 2026.
He first earned the Western Hockey League’s goalie of the week distinction in mid-December, then once during January, twice in February, and so far one in March.
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