The biggest goal of Tyler Sandhu’s university hockey career has the UBC Thunderbirds on a historical playoff run.
The third-year forward from Richmond scored the game winner early in the final period as UBC stunned regular season champion Alberta 2-1 on Sunday night in Edmonton in the third and deciding game of the Canada West semi-final series.
The Thunderbirds are not only off to the Canada West championship series next weekend in Saskatchewan for the first time in 42 years but they also advance to the David Johnston University Cup national finals in Halifax — March 12-15.
UBC (9-14-5) finished fifth in regular season play and took out fourth place Mt. Royal (18-8-2) in the quarter-finals a week earlier. Alberta finished on top of the conference with a 23-5-0 record and swept all four league meetings from the Thunderbirds.
However, UBC opened the series with a 3-2 win then dropped a 6-1 decision in game two — setting the stage for the series finale.
Sandhu gave the 'Birds their first lead of the series since the final period of game one with what turned out to be the game winner at the 2:18 mark of the third.
Jake Kryski fired a shot from the slot that was blocked but as the Bears were attempting to clear, Sandhu stole the puck and fired it on goal from a sharp angle for his first of the post-season.
Alberta pressed for the equalizer the remainder of the period, firing 21 shots on goaltender Rylan Toth who turned aside each and every one of them. The T-Birds also killed off both third period Alberta power plays.
“In playoffs you need a hot goaltender and you need a group that feels that they can accomplish anything," said UBC head coach Sven Butenschon. “That's a deadly combination and that's what happened here in Edmonton this weekend.”
The UBC roster features two other Richmond natives — Carter Popoff and Shaun Dosanjh. All three brought their careers to UBC after a number of seasons in the Western Hockey League
Next weekend will be UBC's fifth conference final appearance since their first such series in 1971 where they defeated the Manitoba Bisons in two games to secure their lone championship banner to date.
