Lakers double up Thunder in Game 3

Eli Salama defends against Peterborough's Shawn Evans during Game 3 of the Mann Cup Championships on Monday at the Peterborough Memorial Centre. Gary Ahuja Langley Thunder photo

The defending champion Peterborough Lakers silenced the Langley Thunder offence to earn their first win of the Mann Cup championships.

Trailing 3-2 after a period, the Lakers outscored the Thunder 5-1 in the middle stanza and never looked back, picking up the 12-6 win in game three on Monday night at the Peterborough Memorial Centre.

Langley leads the best-of-seven series 2-1 and it continues Tuesday night with an 8:00pm (5:00pm PST) start time as Langley looks to get back in the win column.

A big difference between games one and two and game three was the fact the Lakers were able to contain the Thunder duo of Curtis Dickson (nine goals, 19 points) and Dane Dobbie (eight goals, 18 points), who had combined for 17 goals and 37 points over the first two games. But game three saw the pair held to a single goal apiece and a total of seven points.

And while Langley  did a better job of containing Shawn Evans (two goals, 16 assists) and Mark Matthews (four goals, five assists) – they were held to a combined five assists – it was the trio of Holden Cattoni, Joe Resetarits and Taite Cattoni leading the way for Peterborough.

Holden Cattoni led all scorers with five goals and eight points – and earned his team’s Player of the Game – and his brother Taite scored a hat trick while Joe Resetarits made his series debut and finished with two goals and two assists

“It was huge for us; he is so dynamic; he draws one if not two guys and everyone’s full attention,” Peterborough coach Mike Hasen said of Resetarits return, also adding that the fresh legs of a day off was also a factor.

“(Defensively) we weren’t on our heels tonight; I think we were on our toes and were kind of moving forward as opposed to standing and watching and reacting to what they were doing. We were just dictating a bit more tonight,” he added.

“Offensively, especially, we just finally bought into what we wanted to do as far as our game plan was concerned. We were consistent with it; the ball was moving consistently, and the group was moving consistently. We did the simple stuff tonight.”

On the other side of the floor, it is back to the drawing board for the Thunder as their high-powered offence was held to six goals. Captain Connor Robinson – who was Langley’s Player of the Game – was the only Thunder player with multiple goals, scoring twice, while Dickson (one goal, three assists), Dobbie (one goal, two assists), Robert Church (one goal, two assists) and Dylan Kinnear (one goal, one assist) providing the rest of the offence.

In goal, Frank Scigliano made 37 saves as his team was outshot 49-41 with his counterpart Matt Vinc stopping 35.

“We didn’t execute very well, especially up front tonight. We just didn’t have the footwork, the attacking the net. We ended up taking some late shots which spurred their defence to get down the floor. We need to start attacking like we were and putting them on the heels,” said Langley coach Rod Jensen.

“The guy (Vinc) is a world-class goalie and if we don’t step forward and attack the net, he is going to play well.”

Game notes:

Paul Dawson and Matt Gilray had the other two Peterborough goals.

Peterborough had three power-play goals on eight chances while the Thunder went 2-for-7. Langley also scored twice while short-handed while the Lakers scored once when they were a man down.

Scigliano also came up with a penalty shot save in the first period.

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