Greece Athena/Odyssey 8, Churchville Chili 0

D&C Staff Reports 12/11/08

Riley Bourbonnais scored four goals and added two assists to lead the Thunder (5-0). Erik Gunderson had a goal and three assists and Brandon Cheeseman scored two goals with an assist for Greece. Pat Sofia also scored for the Thunder and Parker Bonis made 10 saves for the shutout. Dylan Nowinski made 39 saves for Churchville (0-4).

Wes Vyverberg Reports

Thurs Dec 11th Game Report

It's been a rough season for the anthem guild with several false starts and last night was no exception, thanks to technical difficulties with the new sound system at Lakeshore, which prevented Austin Pelletier from doing the honors. Can I get a sound check here please... test, 1-2, check, test. The Section Five Hockey save of the week goes out to Wendy Bonis for conducting the crowd through an impromtu a cappella version of the anthem from across the ice. And then a hockey game broke out, or something like that, where Thunder dominated a depleted Churchville-Chili Saints squad, outshooting them (15-4, 15-3, 17-3, for a 3-period total of 47-10) and delivering them a difficult 8-0 decision. What's more, it was a nite of firsts with the likes of Tyler Grimshaw and Curran O'Brien each recording their first varsity point, and Joe Vyverberg seeing his first varsity shift along side his older brother Dan, as the bench went wild shouting "Snaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaake". For the uninitiated, Vyper and Snake have a younger brother, affectionately known as "Worm", so be on the lookout for Stevie donning a Thunder sweater in a few years.

On with the show. First on the board was Riley Bourbonnais redirecting an Eric Gunderson shot from the point past the Saints freshman keeper. Matt Lane picked up the second helper on the goal which came 3.5 minutes into the contest. Next up to the plate was Brandon Cheeseman with the highlight-reel goal of the game, a snipe under the crossbar that prompted some young whipper-snapper in the stands to comment, "that was dirty". Surely you all know by now that "bad, mad, hot, sick, and nasty" are all terms of endearment with our kids these days, but I am still trying to get my head around the "dirty" reference. As usual, I digress. Tyler Grimshaw and Jordan Grills each logged an assist on Cheese's production, which made it 2-0 Thunder. Bourbonnais netted the third thunder tally unassisted off a scrum in front of the Saints goal. With just 36 seconds to go in the first period, it was #36 taking a feed from Cheeseman and burying the shortie with a wrister from the top of the circle for the hat and just like that it was 4-0 Thunder.

With an ever increasing amount of blood in the water, second period action saw the Thunder forwards circling like a bunch of sharks with laser beams attached to their heads. Take for example Bourbonnais, who got his fourth goal of the evening, picking up the trash on a powerplay shot by Stenglein. Now mind you, Bonis had only seen a handful of shots up to this point and one parent in the stand jokingly shouted out to Parker asking him if he needed a book to read, but to Bonis' credit, he was somehow able to remain focussed as evidenced by his demeanor stoning several point blank chances for the Saints that resulted from turnovers. Pat Sofia capped off the second period picking the puck out of the air to put away a centering pass threaded from the corner by Bourbonnais on the powerplay. Greg Ryan assisted on Thunder's sixth goal as well.

With a 6-0 lead going into the final frame, the entire Thunder bench got in on the action. Gunda had a crossbar-snipe of his own, assisted by Rilez late in the period. And then with just 15 seconds to go in the contest the crowd erupted when Curran O'Brien took a feed from Gunderson and set up Brandon Cheeseman for the final goal of the game. There was a nice distribution with 10 different point getters, however first star of the game honors clearly go to Riley Bourbonnais with an impressive six-point performance. Second star goes to the Cheese who was rewarded for his hard work and determination with a pair of goals and an assist for 3-points. And third star goes to the Saints tender, Dylan Niewiemski, who saw beacoup slovakia and maintained his composure, saving 39 of the 47 shots he faced.

Parker Bonis made 10 saves for his second shut-out and 4th win of the season as Thunder advanced their record to 5 wins 0 losses and kept the streak alive. Speaking of streaks, Tuesday Dec 16th we're going "Old School" at MCC, "streaking through the quad to the gymnasium" and then on to the ESL Sports Centre for a 4:30pm matinee with the Spencerport Rangers. C'mon, everybody's doing it!