2nd period landslide paces Warriors past Knights

WASILLA — Wasilla exploded for five goals over the final 6 minutes of the second period Friday to shut out cross-Valley rival Colony 6-0 in the Knights’ hockey home opener at the Brett Memorial Ice Arena.

Leading 1-0 off a Colton Fletcher goal with no time remaining in the first period, the second belonged to Warrior sophomores Adam Apangalook and Tanner Schachle, who burned the Knights for two goals each in the final 6:03. With Wasilla already leading 3-0 thanks to an unassisted steal and breakaway goal from Schachle and shorthanded breakaway goal from Fletcher (another sophomore) earlier in the second period, Apangalook poked a puck past the Colony goalkeeper shorthanded at the 1:44 mark, assisted by Fletcher.

About 1:11 later, Apangalook netted another puck on a breakaway steal, then Schachle repeated the feat five seconds later to round out the Wasilla scoring.

The win was the second of the season for Wasilla (2-3), while Colony dropped to 0-1.

That disparity in game experience early in the season was evident, said Wasilla head coach Bill Sturdevant.

“We’ve been in that situation before, practicing for four or five weeks before your first game, so I know what it’s like to walk into your first game like that,” he said. “It definitely paid off having those games early on, and they were tough games against quality programs, Anchorage schools.”

What was a 6-minute nightmare for Colony was a case of everything going the Warriors’ way for Wasilla, Sturdevant said.

“I think everything just clicked for us in that second (period),” he said. “We work on those things in practice.”

On the other side of the ice, Colony head coach Jamie Smith said Friday’s opener was a rough one for the Knights.

“The bottom line was we had five minutes of blowup and it cost us five goals,” he said. “The in the first period, there’s that first goal with 1 second (left). That was a tough one right there.”

In what would turn out to be the game-winner, Fletcher and the Warriors capitalized on a power play with time winding down in the first period, poking the puck past Colony keeper Colton Beebe with no time remaining. It gave Wasilla a 1-0 lead going into the first break, and gave the Warriors momentum, Smith said.

Without that goal and the second-period blowup, “it’s a different game,” Smith said.

Along with getting off to a shaky start, Smith said he was disappointed in the play of his top lines, but said his third line “played out of this world.”

“I played my younger guys and they played very, very well,” he said. “One thing I saw was nothing from our top two lines, and what I did see was our third line play unbelievable. They’re a bunch of meat-and-potato guys who work their (butts) off. Our top leader guys need to step up to the plate and get busy.”

Both teams were keeping the scorekeeper busy, playing a chippy first game that saw the Warriors and Knights combine for 16 penalties, including 14 in the first two periods.

Although Sturdevant said he would like to see the Warriors not commit as many penalties, he was pleased with the performance of his penalty kill unit.

“I know our power play is a work in progress, which is OK now early in the season,” he said. “I think by the end of the year we definitely want to be clicking and taking advantage of those opportunities more. But our penalty kill was fantastic.”

He also was impressed with Apangalook’s effort to score his goals in 1:11 of clock time.

“It was amazing the work he put in on those,” he said. “It’s always good to get a shortie and we got two tonight. Just the effort all around tonight was incredible.”

With the score remaining 1-0 in Wasilla’s favor more than midway through the second period, it seemed the teams were hunkering down for a low-scoring duel. That’s when Schachle turned the momentum for the Warriors with a steal near his own blue line and breakaway, poking a hard wrister over Beebe’s left shoulder into the corner of the net.

That gave Wasilla a 2-0 advantage and set up Fletcher with a déjà vu play nearly two minutes later, when the sophomore forward poked the puck free and sprinted in for an unassisted goal and a 3-0 lead.

Apangalook and Schachle closed out the offensive exhibition in the final 1:44 of the second period.

Although it was Colony’s first game, the intensity was at mid-season level, Sturdevant said.

“Anytime we get a rivalry game like this, especially in this atmosphere at the Brett, (some penalties) are to be expected,” he said. “We know going in emotions are going to run high.”

Wasilla 6, Colony 0

Friday, Brett Memorial Ice Arena

First period — 1. Wasilla- Fletcher (Schachle, C. Hansen) 0:00.

Second period — 2. Wasilla- Schachle (unassisted) 6:03; 3. Fletcher (unassisted) 4:06; 4. Apangalook (Fletcher) 1:44; 5. Apangalook (unassisted) 32.7; 6. Schachle (unassisted) 27.3.

Third period — no scoring.

Shots on goal: Wasilla 10-8-8—26, Colony 5-6-4—15; Saves: Wasilla- Massie 15, Colony- Beebe 20.

Wasilla 2, Service 1

ANCHORAGE — Wasilla followed a charged-up win over Colony with a hard-fought win on the road over Service on Saturday, 2-1.

After a scoreless first period, Troy Verplancke gave the Warriors a 1-0 lead in the second period, which was extended to 2-0 on a goal from Tanner Schachle. Service cut the lead with a goal of its own later in the second, but the Wasilla defense and penalty kill unit was solid the rest of the way, head coach Bill Sturdevant said.

“I think we still had a lot of time on the penalty kill and not quite as much power play time as we’d like,” he said. “But I was definitely happy with the effort. Anytime you can come to Anchorage and get a win over an Anchorage team is huge.”