Tyler Brennan isn’t sticking around much longer with his Prince George Cougar teammates and that’s a bit of shame.
They’re going to miss the big guy and his puck-stopping abilities when he’s in Texas representing Canada in the IIHF U-18 world hockey championship, especially if he keeps playing like he did Sunday night against the Vancouver Giants in the WHL pod in Kamloops.
Brennan put on a stellar 43-save display of goaltending for his first career Western Hockey League shutout, but it wasn’t enough to guarantee a two-point takeaway and the Giants found a way to win 1-0 in a shootout.
Tristan Nielsen scored the only goal, in the third round of the shootout, beating Brennan low to the blocker side for the walk-off winner as the Giants improved to 3-1-0-0.
“It’s an outstanding game from Tyler again, he obviously gave us an opportunity to get a point and kept us in the game for the whole night,” said Cougars associate coach Jason Smith.
“He’s got great poise in there, he’s a big body and he definitely showed tonight that he’s patient and he competed in there, he never gave up on a puck. There were times when there was second and third opportunities around the net but he was fighting for space and staying big in the net and that’s what you want from your goaltending.”
Brennan, a WHL sophomore from Winnipeg, will be forced to leave the Cats at the end of next week for the start of the 10-team U-18 tournament April 26. The tournament runs through May 5 and he won’t be back before the WHL season ends on May 9. So you can expect the Cougars to put him to work as much as they can between now and then while he shares the crease with starter Taylor Gauthier.
The scoreless draw heading into the shootout and Brennan’s outstanding performance in his 18th career WHL game disguised how badly the Cougars were outplayed by the Giants while being outshot 43-14. Much of the game was played in the Cougar zone and the shots reflected that. The Prince George offence that’s scored just 10 goals in four games stagnated again and their lack of intensity in Sunday’s game, especially from the older players, did not sit well with the Cougar coaching staff.
“We were a little slow, a little sloppy, we didn’t quite have the work ethic and the energy that you need to have to get better results as a group,” said Smith. “We need to be sharper than we were.
“It has to start with your veteran players and your leadership group. They need to be the ones who are doing things right. Our execution needs to be at a way higher level and our attention to communicating as a group on the ice, they need to be louder and guys need to hear you want the puck. When we’re in the D-zone we need to have communication and that needs to be your guys who have experience.”
The Giants had a chance to end it with three minutes left in regulation time when Koehn Ziemmer took a high-sticking penalty which put the Giants on the power play for the sixth time in the game. Brennan made a couple of routine stops near the end of the penalty and the Cougars dodged a bullet.
In overtime, the Cougars got a late 4-on-3 power play with 1:16 left in the five-minute session but were unable to get a good shot at the Giants’ net before time ran out.
Both goalies were credited with shutouts. Giants netminder Trent Miner has yet to give up a goal this season. He blanked the Kelowna Rockets in a 6-0 win on March 28.
