VICTORIA 14
BURNABY 7
The Victoria Shamrocks offence continues to light up opposition goalies and the Green and White’s defence maintains its ability to clamp down as the season progresses for the Western Lacrosse Association leaders.
The Shamrocks racked up an impressive 14-7 victory on the road over the Burnaby Lakers on Tuesday night to stretch their win streak to 11 games and up the team’s record to 11-2.
Corey Small led the way with three goals and three assists as the visitors opened up a 6-2 lead after the first period. All but one assist came in a lively second period for the WLA points leader.
“Corey had a big second period and I challenged the guys to be a bit more physical tonight,” said head coach Bob Heyes. “We have things to improve on in our game and being physical is one of them. That aspect of the game came up in the third period and I thought we took control of that.”
League-leading assists collector Cory Conway added four more helpers and also recorded a pair of goals for a similar six-point outing.
Daryl Veltman had two goals and two assists while Karsen Leung, Dan MacRae, Tyler Hass, Rhys Duch, Ryan Dilks, Mitch Jones and captain Scott Ranger added single tallies.
Dan Dawson, who rejoined the club for the night and was flying back to Ontario following the game, had two assists for Victoria while the WLA-leading scorer coming into the game, Jesse King, was held out of the scoring column, but did have three assists.
Goaltender Cody Hagedorn stopped 29 shots for the winners, who remain without starter Aaron Bold. He will not return to the club until the last three games of the regular season.
Hagedorn and Matt Roik have held the fort well since the opening week of play when the team suffered its only two losses of the campaign, both to the Nanaimo Timbermen, who have not won since.
Jason Jones and Robert Church, each with a pair, Peter McFetridge, Jason Decker and Jamie Lincoln replied for the Lakers. Tye Bellanger and Joe Bell faced 48 shots on goal for Burnaby.
Victoria returns home to face Coquitlam on Friday at 7:45 p.m. at The Q Centre.
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