The No. 3 Lakehead Thunderwolves defeated the Ryerson Rams 7-0 Saturday night before 3033 fans at the Fort William Gardens in Thunder Bay. Lakehead was led by rookie Francis Walker and veteran Chris Shaffer with 2 goals apiece. Murray Magill, Jeff Richards, and Sean Stefanski notched singles for Lakehead. Wolves' netminder Chris Whitley notched his second shutout of the OUA regular season, and third overall. Shots were 54-18 Lakehead in the game. The win puts Lakehead's OUA mark at 10-2-0-0 (16-4-1-1 overall) while Ryerson's OUA record goes to 0-12-0-0 (0-16-0-0 overall).
Lakehead's Sean Stefanski opened the scoring with an unassisted shorthanded goal at 5:50. Stefanski intercepted a Ryerson pass at the Lakehead blueline and broke in alone on Rams' netminder Alex Turgeon-Cote, dropped him with a fake and tucked it in right side low. Turgeon-Cote came up with a series of good stops, including blocking a deflection by Chris Shaffer. Ryerson had one good chance when Lakehead netminder Chris Whitley misplayed a carom off the boards but Lakehead d-man Mike Self saved the day by hooking down Ryerson's Matt Murphy who was ready to pounce on the puck in front of the empty Wolves' goal. Lakehead's Francis Walker scored at 15:51, knocking in his own rebound. Assists went to Murray Magill and Peter Cava. Ryerson's frustration boiled over and a fight broke out between Lakehead's Stefanski and Ryerson's Matt Murphy as well as Lakehead's Drew Kivell and Ryerson's Brett Toskan. All four were given 10-minute misconducts and Lakehead came out of the fray one man down. Shots were 22-4 Lakehead in the first.
The second opened with some hard hitting from both sides. Lakehead controlled play for the first four minutes but Ryerson fired a couple shots on Whitley at the 5:00 mark. Turgeon-Cote made an excellent save off Lakehead's Jeff Richards at 8:10. Ryerson went on the powerplay at 11:00, and Whitley made a good stick save off the Rams' Jason Francis. Sides evened up and Joel Scherban, parked behind the Ryerson goal, passed the puck to Jeff Richards sitting in the slot and Richards fired a rocket top shelf that Turgeon-Cote didn't even see. The other assist went to Dene Poulin. Ryerson went hard after the ensuing faceoff and forced Whitley to come up with an incredible save. Lakehead drew a series of minors at the three-quarter mark of the period, going two men down. While shorthanded, Scherban missed a glorious opportunity; dropping Turgeon-Cote with a fake but firing the puck into the back of the goalie's pads. Turgeon-Cote was shaken up in an ensuing pile-up but shook it off and returned to make a great save off Lakehead's Stefanski at the 17:20 mark followed by another soon after off Tobias Whelan. However, Francis Walker scored at 18:22when jumped on a rebound after a shot by Murray Magill flipped high up and over Turgeon-Cote falling behind the netminder leaving easy prey for Walker. Chris Shaffer made it 5-0 at 18:56 scoring with a hard wrist shot from the hash marks, set up perfectly by Scherban coming out from behind the Ryerson goal. Lakehead outshot Ryerson 12-9 in the second.
Action was slow in the third until Lakehead's Shaffer notched his second of the game at 5:51, assisted by Richards and Erik Lodge. Ryerson's Chris Pethick broke in alone on Lakehead's Whitley who made a nice pad save on the breakaway. Lakehead then went back up the ice and Walker almost scored his third, firing a shot that trickled through Turgeon-Cote's pads wide. Murray Magill made it 8-0 at 8:01, firing it in from the slot, assisted by Jounni Kuokkanen. Play continued on much as before, with Turgeon-Cote making some more good stops, until the period was over. Lakehead outshot Ryerson 20-5 in the third and 54-18 on the night.