Solid 60 minutes sends Thunder to victory

Langley's Noah Buchan (right) and Logan Kierstead double-team a Burnaby player during BC Junior Tier 1 Lacrosse League action at Langley Events Centre on Tuesday (June 13). Gary Ahuja LEC photo

The Langley Thunder’s playoff hopes remain alive.

The Thunder delivered a solid 60-minute effort to defeat the Burnaby Lakers 14-5 on Tuesday night at Langley Events Centre in BC Junior Tier 1 Lacrosse League action. The victory allows Langley (4-10, 8 points) to leapfrog the Lakers (3-11-1, 7 points) for the eighth and final post-season berth. Langley has four games remaining in the regular season while Burnaby plays three more times.

Burnaby opened the scoring just over two minutes into the game, but the Thunder responded with Noah Buchan forcing a turnover on the Langley side of the floor, before streaking down to the other end and scoring a diving, individual goal to tie the score just 11 seconds later.

The goal sparked the Thunder who dominated the rest of the period and led 4-1 after one period. And Langley – which has been plagued by poor second periods on multiple occasions this season – did not let up, outscoring the Lakers 7-2 in the middle frame. The final period featured five goals, but three came from Langley as they won all three periods.

For much of the season, the coaching staff has been stressing the need for the team to string together three solid periods and on Tuesday, they finally came through in what was their largest margin of victory on the season.

“Everyone did their job today. For a young group, they need to learn how to do that. And I think that is what is going to make them better as we keep moving forward,” said head coach Darren Buchan.

“It is a confidence boost. It puts us in a playoff spot, it gives us a couple of opportunities to keep fighting. And they are looking for a reason to fight because we have so many injuries,” the coach said, referencing the fact they have had seven season-ending injuries.

Another factor in the victory was having both sides of the offence working as Vaughn Pinchin (3+3) and Jake Newby (3+1) both had hat tricks. Joseph Killcommons added a pair while Buchan, Brock Lamotte (1+1), Logan Kierstead, Mac Timms (1+2), Connor Welsch (1+2) and Talon Schroeder (1+1) had a goal apiece.

The offensive outburst marked the second time in the past three games Langley has scored in double digits and they are now 2-1 in that span.

“It has been either our right-side is going or its our left-side, this time we had both and our defence played great, and our goalie (Todd Hensrud) only let in five goals on 39 shots,” Buchan said.

Anthony Vargas led the Lakers with three goals.

Langley does not have much time to rest up as they are right back in action on Wednesday (June 14) with a visit to the Coquitlam Sports Centre where they will face the Adanacs (12-1).

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