LANGLEY, British Columbia – The Trinity Western Spartans were unable to repeat last night's heroics this afternoon in Winnipeg as the Spartans fell 3-0 to the Manitoba Bisons in Canada West men's hockey action Sunday afternoon at the Wayne Fleming Arena in Winnipeg, Man. The loss drops the Spartans to 2-14, while the win improves the Bisons to 6-9.
 
Similarly to Saturday night's contest the Spartans gave up two first period goals to trail 2-0 after 20 minutes, but this afternoon TWU was unable to comeback as they were shutout by Manitoba's Jeremy Link. The Bisons added an insurance goal in the third period to make the final 3-0 for Manitoba.
 
AS IT HAPPENED
The Bisons' Ryan Carlson opened the scoring with his second of the season to give his squad a 1-0 lead halfway through the first period. Shortly after, Spartans goalie Berk Berkeliev made a sensational save to hold his team within one, but the Bisons went up 2-0 off a goal from Tony Apetagon, whose shot from below the goal line bounced off the first-year netminder.

The second period brought some outstanding play from both goalies. With the game still at 2-0 in favour of the Bisons, Jeremy Link made a point-blank stop on Kylor Wall who was alone in the slot, maintaining Manitoba's lead of two. Not long after, Berkeliev denied Apetagon of his second goal of the game. The two teams went scoreless and the Herd took their two-goal lead into the third period.

Bison forward Colton Veloso scored his third goal of the weekend to extend his team's lead to 3-0. Devon Skoleski won the face-off clean, right onto the stick of Veloso who fired high and over the blocker of Berkeliev.

NOTABLE

• Berk Berkeliev made 42 saves for the Spartans in the loss, while Jeremy Link made 29 saves for the Bisons to earn the shutout win.
• Manitoba out shot Trinity Western 45-29.
• TWU was 0/1 on the power play, while Manitoba was 0/5.

QUOTABLE
TWU Head Coach Barret Kropf
"They got two in the first the same way as they did last night, seeing eye pucks that found their way into the net and a couple of bounces and then we were chasing the game again. And we couldn't capitalize this time around."
 
"It's a long way to travel and have a quick turnaround for a one o'clock game the next day is pretty tall ask when you only have 21 guys and they through five fresh bodies in there and it showed. They had a lot more energy throughout the 60 minutes."
 
"For a road game it was a pretty good effort but disappointed that we couldn't get two wins this weekend but we have lots to build on as we move into the last four games of the season."
 
"Berky gave us a chance. He competed hard in net for us tonight. And the young guys continue to show that they can compete and our old guys just keep showing us how to play in tough areas of the ice and block shots. Nothing to hang our heads, split weekend on the road and we are going to build off of this for next weekend."
 
TWU Captain Spencer Gerth
"We want to be playing spoiler for the rest of the season. We know we aren't going to the playoffs but we are going to try and upset these really good teams that we are coming up against next."
 
UP NEXT
The Spartans will now head home to host the University of Alberta Golden Bears on Friday, February 4 and Saturday February 5. Friday's game has a 7:15 p.m. puck drop at the George Preston Recreation Centre, while Saturday's contest has a 7 p.m. start at the Langley Events Centre. Both games can be seen live on Canadawest.tv.

About Spartan Athletics
As official members of U SPORTS, the Spartans currently compete in 13 sports in the Canada West conference, including women's and men's soccer, volleyball, basketball, hockey, cross country and track & field, as well as women's rugby sevens. TWU also competes as an independent team in men's rugby. Since TWU entered U SPORTS in 1999, the Spartans have won 12 U SPORTS team championships and 29 Canada West team championships.
 
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