Ice loose series 4-1 to Acadia

The Acadia Grizzly Bears booked their ticket to the Canadian Conference Finals with a 6-3 win in Game 5 over the Niagara Ice. Noah Cates scored his first 2 goals of the playoffs, Shane Pinto with goals 5 and 6, and Jacob Trouba had 2 assists. Goalie, Logan Thompson, with 28 saves. Responding for Niagara was Frank Vatrano with 2 goals (5,6) and Kent Johnson had 3 assists. Defenseman, Jake Sanderson, with his 7th assist finishes the playoffs with 11 points (4G,7A) in 11 games. Niagara was in tough dealing with the likes of Acadia forwards, Mikko Rantanen (8G,5A), Chris Kreider (6G,7A), And Brandon Hagel (4G,8A). Hagel was an Ice killer with 8 points in the first 4 games of the series. Goalie, Logan Thompson, leads the playoffs with a 1.93 GAA and .929 save %. He has a record of 8-2-0 overall. Even when Niagara had a push, Thompson had the answer shutting the door. 

BREAKING DOWN THE SERIES:

The Ice never really could find any footing in this series. Game #1 was close, a 3-1 Acadia win but Niagara didnt score until the 6:19 mark of the 3rd period. In Game #2, Niagara chased the whole game. It wasnt even close. Acadia jumped to 4-0 and 5-1 Leads. Casey Desmith was chased in the 2nd period. Brock Faber, Brandon Hagel, and Chris Kreider were unstoppable. Acadia would go 3-6 on the powerplay.

The series shifted to Niagara where the Ice found hope with a huge 4-3 overtime win in Game 3. Again, Niagara would trail the game. It was 3-0 Acadia going to the 3rd period before the Ice would rally. Brad Marchand would score his 1st of the playoffs in overtime. Jake Sanderson with his 4th goal on the powerplay. Goalie, Casey DeSmith, would bounce back with 41 saves. The Ice would outshoot Acadia 47-44. The overtime thriller seemed to take its toll on the Ice. In Game 4, Niagara would start goalie, Semyon Varlamov, in place of DeSmith. Several other players were banged up and had their ice time cut down. The lines were changed up. No excuses said the Ice Brass after a lack luster 5-0 home ice loss. With the momentum on their side, Niagara would flop. They would get outshot 46-25. The faceoff dot wasnt even close. Acadia would win 62.85% of the draws. Acadia showed why they were a 1st place team. Other than the 3rd /Overtime periods in Game 3, Acadia was the better team. The Ice didnt have an answer. 

Game 5 Niagara would go on the road with their backs against the wall. The team was broken in Game 4 and it showed in Game 5. Noah Cates would score 1:29 into the 1st period. Then again at 10:49. Acadia with a 2-0 lead just over halfway thru the 1st period. Niagara would get some life back when Frank Vatrano scored at 11:19. Acadia led 2-1 after the 1st period. In the 2nd, Acadia would score 2 more and go up 4-1. Vatrano again would reply for Niagara at 15:32 to cut the deficit to 4-2. However, Acadia would come out strong in the 3rd and score 2 more goals going up 6-2. The final would end up 6-3 for Acadia. Again, Niagara with some moments but never really close. Acadia looked like the best team in the Conference.

ROUND 2 ICE MEDIA CLOSING COMMENTS WITH OWNER/GM CAMERON SZONDI:

"Well first of all we'd like to congratulate, Guy Flaming, and the Acadia Grizzly Bears on a job well done. They re going to the Canadian Conference Finals and they deserve it. They are a great team and well managed. I thought we were outplayed for most of the series. We were up against a great team and just couldnt find a way. We played better at home in Game 3 but never could get the lead. When we did get some momentum we couldnt sustain it and keep it going. They had an answer for us. We were banged up unfortunately going in Game 4. But it was our own fault because we were always chasing the games. We put ourselves in bad situations. So no excuses there. We tried but in the end lost to a great team."

"I am really proud of our guys. They dont quit. We have good leadership in the room. We found a way in Round 1. It took alot to get through Banff. They were a really good team. We didnt have it in the 2nd Round. We played playoff hockey for most of the 2nd half of the season just to get into the playoffs. Acquiring goalie, Casey DeSmith, was a huge turning point for us early in the season. He was rock solid for us all the way through. He played a career high 61 games for us. In the playoffs, he finished with .915 sv%. He is a big reason why we were successful. Jake Sanderson was amazing. 91 points and he played a full season of 82 games for us. There were times he was playing 20-24 mins a game. Brad Marchand with a full 82 games and 79 points. Heart and soul player that everyone hates to play against. He gave us everything he had. He was fighting it a bit in the playoffs and maybe not scoring like he wanted to, but he brings so much more than just scoring. Its his energy and drawing others into the fight that make him such a good leader. Frank Vatrano had a career year. (34G,37A,71PTS), led us in the playoffs. Sean Monahan missed almost half season and came back to give us what he had. Tomas Hertl is always good. Our 3rd line of Kent Johnson, Morgan Geekie, Tyson Foerster, always giving us energy are only gonna get better. There were many other players i havent named that gave us everything they had night in and night out. I could go on and on, thats how much i was impressed with our group."

ICE MEDIA ASKS SZONDI ABOUT WHATS NEXT:

"Well we have a good mixture of veterans and younger players on this team. We have areas we ll likely address in the off season. All in all, i like the makeup of this team. We have a good number of youth coming up through our system over the next few years. Our job is to keep finding prospects and developing. The draft will ofcourse be a focus for us. We ll see what happens at Free Agency this summer as well. For now, we will do exit interviews and get a perspective on how the guys felt the season went. For management and myself, we ll take a few weeks away from things to decompress. Then we ll meet back here and plan our off season which is always busy. In saying that, I want to thank the fans who are passionate about this time. They had stood by us all the way through. A reason our building was so tough to play in. Especially in Round 1 being as loud as they were. I cant thank them enough. They should be excited about this team. Good times are on the horizon forsure."