Posted on Posted in Game Recaps

McFadden & Hoyt with 2 assists each in loss

WOLFVILLE, N.S. – Despite an attempted comeback by the home team, the Saint Mary’s Huskies (3-3-0) defeated the Acadia Axemen (2-4-0) by a score of 5-3 on Friday night. Acadia nearly doubled up the Huskies in shots, but a pair of goals from both Subway First Star of the Night Joel Bishop and Keith Getson was enough to give the Huskies the win.

Saint Mary’s jumped out to an early lead and continued to dominate the scoring, putting up three goals in the first period.

Their first goal of the night came 22 seconds into the game on a quick shot close to the net from Joel Bishop.

The Huskies’ passing got the Acadia’s goalie Logan Flodell moving side-to-side, and Bishop finished on a pass in front to make it 1-0.

Keith Getson added a pair of goals, including a power-play marker at the 4:00 mark in the first to give Saint Mary’s a 3-0 lead heading into the second period.

Getson’s second goal came out of a nice passing play in the offensive zone that ended with Getson taking a pass from Mitchell Balmas and sliding a shot under the pad of Flodell.

By the end of the opening period, Saint Mary’s held a 12-7 shots on goal lead.

While the Huskies added two more goals in the second, Acadia replied with two tallies in the final two minutes of the period.

Mitchell Balmas added to the Huskies’ lead in the second with another power-play goal to give Saint Mary’s a commanding 4-0 lead.

Dawson Theede faked a shot at the top of the right face-off circle and passed to Balmas in front for an easy tap-in goal.

Adding to their lead a few minutes later, Bishop netted his second of the night. Through the middle of Acadia’s zone, Bishop took a pass from Nathan Dunkley, and wired a wrist shot into the top left corner of the net to make it 5-0.

Acadia answered back with under two minutes left in the period when Maurizio Colella ripped a one-timer from the middle of the offensive zone to make it 5-1.

Adam McMaster ended the second on a high note for the Axemen, scoring a powerplay goal with 0.2 seconds remaining in the period.

McMaster’s goal came out of a mad scramble in front of the net. He chipped the puck in under the pad of the Huskies’ goalie Matt Welsh to close the gap to 5-2 going into the third.

After two periods of play, the shots were 25-16 in Acadia’s favour.

The Axemen continued to mount a comeback in the third but ultimately fell short.

The second star of the night, Keegan Stevenson, gave Acadia their second power-play goal of the game with 5:37 left in the third. Stevenson jammed the puck by Welsh in front of the net to narrow the Huskies’ lead to 5-3.

Acadia goalie Logan Flodell turned aside 17 of 22 shots on the night, while his Saint Mary’s counterpart – and third star of the night – Matt Welsh stopped 41 of the 44 pucks he saw.

The Axemen take to the ice again Saturday, Oct. 23 against the UPEI Panthers before returning home for a rematch with the Huskies Wednesday, Oct. 27. The Axemen’s next home game will cap off four games in week schedule. The puck drop for both games is at 7:00 pm.

Provided by Josh Foote, Acadia Athletics Communications

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McFadden nets pair in Acadia loss

WOLFVILLE, N.S. – Continuing their strong opening to the season, the USPORTS No. 10 ranked StFX X-Men (5-1-0) pulled off a convincing 7-4 win against the No. 5 ranked Acadia Axemen (2-4-0) on Wednesday night.

One bright spot for the Axemen came when Keegan Stevenson scored his first USPORTS career goal. He potted his goal on the power-play while parked in front of the net where he lifted a backhand in tight under the crossbar.

StFX dominated play through the first period and was rewarded with a 4-0 lead by the end of the opening frame.

The X-Men opened the scoring early in the game, thanks to hard work in front of the net from William Bower.

Bower picked up a rebound off the pad of the Acadia goalie Logan Flodell in front of the net and rammed the puck in to make it 1-0.

Less than ten minutes later, StFX doubled their lead on a power-play goal from Subway First Star of the Game, Zack Trott.

In the final two minutes of the frame, StFX added two more goals to take a commanding 4-0 advantage.

The first was a breakaway from Jacob Hudson, who slipped the puck under Flodell’s glove, while the second came from Matthew Struthers, who took a cross-ice pass and lifted the puck under the crossbar in close for the final goal of the period.

By the end of the first period, shots were 14-12 for StFX.

While the second star of the night Garrett McFadden got Acadia on the board with a pair of goals in the second period, the Axemen were still down 5-2 by the end of the second period.

StFX opened the scoring in the third with a goal from third-star of the night Liam Hawel, who snuck a shot in during a scramble in front.

McFadden’s first of the period came on the power-play when he wired a shot from the right side of the ice, while his second came in the last minute of the period when he finished a pass from Maurizio Colella.

At the end of the second period, the X-Men held a 23-19 lead in shots.

It was a high-scoring third period, as both teams added two goals apiece.

StFX got markers from Matthew Phillip and Josh Nelson, while Acadia got goals from Keegan Stevenson and Jack Flaman in the back half of the final frame.

Despite the late reply from the Axemen, they were unable to answer StFX’s strong offensive performance.

Acadia goalie Logan Flodell turned aside 4 of 14 shots, before being pulled at the end of the first. Max Paddock turned aside 11 of 14 shots for Acadia in two periods of play.

StFX goalie Joseph Raaymakers stopped 28 of 32 shots.

Acadia’s next game is Friday, Oct. 22 at home against the Saint Mary’s Huskies, while StFX takes on UNB this Friday, Oct. 22. The puck drop for both games is 7:00 pm.

Provided by Josh Foote, Acadia Athletics Communications

Posted on Posted in Game Recaps

Paddock records his first AUS win

WOLFVILLE, N.S. – Make it two straight home wins for the Acadia Axemen (2-2-0), as the team grabbed a 3-2 win against the Moncton Aigles Bleus on Friday night. Acadia was helped by the performance of their goaltender and third star of the night Max Paddock, who turned aside 29 of 31 shots on the night.

Although Acadia held the lead for the entirety of the game, Moncton applied plenty of pressure, as they had the Axemen scrambling defensively in the final minute of the game with a 6-on-5 advantage in the Acadia zone.

Although the Axemen only had eight shots in the opening frame, they held a 2-1 lead by period end.

The home team opened the scoring early with a marker from Subway First Star of the Game Maurizio Colella exactly four minutes into the first period.

Colella streaked in front of the net, where he took a pass from Eric Henderson – who was set up behind the Moncton net – and waited out the goalie on his forehand just long enough to slide it in for a 1-0 lead.

To double up their lead, Adam McMaster tallied a power-play marker. McMaster took a cross-zone pass from McFadden at the top of the left face-off circle and wired a wrist shot bar down on the right side of the net.

Moncton cut the lead in half late in the frame when Edouard St-Laurent nabbed the puck in Acadia’s end as both teams were getting ready to leave the zone.

St-Laurent deked out the goalie in tight and lifted a quick wrister under the blocker to set the score at 2-1.

By the end of the first period, the shots were in Moncton’s favour, 10-8.

Chances were had by both sides throughout the second period, but Acadia was the only team to put up any offence in the frame, taking a 3-1 lead into the third.

Shortly after the halfway mark of the second period, Nick Deakin-Poot knocked a puck out of the air in the Moncton zone on a penalty kill. He walked in on the goalie and lifted the puck under the crossbar to give Acadia a 3-1 lead.

At the end of the second period, Acadia held a 24-18 lead in shots.

Moncton answered back early in the third period on a goal from Nathaniel Roy.

Roy picked up a rebound off the goalie’s right pad and fired it in to cut Moncton’s deficit to one.

Yet, that was as close as Moncton would come to tying the game, as they were unable to solve Paddock for the rest of the third, which sealed the Acadia win.

Moncton goalie Emile Samson turned aside 29 of 32 shots.

The second star of the night honours went to Moncton defenceman Francis Thibeault.

The Axemen take to the ice again on Wednesday, Oct. 20 at home against the StFX X-Men, while Moncton faces off against the Saint Mary’s Huskies Saturday, Oct. 16.

Posted on Posted in Team Stories
Jack and his girlfriend Emma Stevens ran the half marathon this past weekend.

WOLFVILLE, N.S. – By John DeCoste ’77 – On Oct. 10, Flaman, a Saskatchewan native, fourth-year Acadia business student and three-year hockey Axemen veteran, ran the half marathon as part of the 29th annual Valley Harvest Marathon.

Despite playing a pair of Axemen hockey games on Friday (in Wolfville) and Saturday (in Antigonish), the 24-year-old Flaman completed the 21.1-kilometre distance in around one hour and 51 minutes.

He took on the challenge as a way of honoring his older brother Mike, diagnosed a year ago with multiple sclerosis (MS), and as a means of raising funds and awareness for MS research.

“I’ve been training for it all summer,” Flaman said in an Oct. 6 interview. He admittedly had not run anything close to a 21-kilometre distance before. “Never,” he said. “It’s something new for me.”

Asked the longest distance he had run at one time, Flaman said that as part of his pre-race training, “I’ve gotten up to around 16 kilometres.” He was confident he would complete the half marathon distance on Oct. 10, adding, “it’s going to be fun. I’m not going to quit now.”

By taking on this challenge, he said, “I am looking to show that regular exercise and being outside doing things is good for you and will likely prolong your life.”

Flaman credited his girlfriend Emma Stevens for playing a big part in his pre-race training and preparation. “One day, she suggested we go running together,” he said – and it became a regular occurrence. Stevens agreed to run part of the half marathon with Flaman. “We’ll run it together.”

His mother Tricia has also been a huge support, especially with his fundraising. “She’s coming out here for the weekend,” Flaman said of his mom. “She hasn’t been here in a year-and-a-half. It’s pretty exciting. She’ll not only get to see me run, but also get to see me play two hockey games.”

In a follow-up email Oct. 11, Flaman described the race as “really fun, actually. The support from all the people on the side of the track really keeps you going.”

He was pleased with his race result, particularly for his first time running the distance. He and Stevens “ran the first half together, and she helped me get through the early grind.” Overall, he “managed to stick to my game plan of taking it easy off the start and getting faster as it went on.”

Flaman’s other goal, raising funds for and awareness of MS, also went well, he said. When we spoke Oct. 6, he had managed to raise around $7,500 toward his ultimate goal of $10,000.

He said Oct. 11, “I managed to surpass my goal of $10,000 before the race started, so I had some extra motivation. I can’t thank enough all the people who supported me and made donations,” he said.

“It started off slow,” he said of the fundraising, “because I didn’t tell a lot of people about it at first. Since I’ve put it out there, the support has been great.”

Flaman said and his brother have always been close. “Mike is three and a half years older than me. Over the past five or six years, we’ve gotten closer than we were when we were younger.”

They have become closer still since Mike’s diagnosis, and despite the distance between Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia, Jack has been there for Mike as much as he can.

After playing hockey at the recreational level, Mike Flaman has taken over helping with the operation of the family dairy farm. “He’s looking to carry on the family business.”

Jack, on the other hand, played four years with a series of junior and major junior hockey teams in western Canada before being recruited to Acadia in the fall of 2018. He played two seasons with the Axemen before he and his teammates had to take last season off due to Covid-19.

He is looking forward to playing a full season in 2021-2022, and also that Acadia is scheduled to host the 2022 University Cup in Halifax next March. “Our goal is to earn our way there, not just be there.”

As for MS, asked if there might be a chance that he might be diagnosed someday, Flaman replied, “with MS, you never really know. That’s the scary part.” His brother, he pointed out, is only 27. “He’s on an experimental medicine program through Health Canada, which is making a big difference for him.”

Posted on Posted in Game Recaps

Flodell with 40 saves in Axemen loss

(FREDERICTON, NB) In a renewal of one of Atlantic University Sports’ intensifying rivalries, the UNB REDS scored three times in a five-minute span of the third period as they beat the Acadia Axemen 4-1, Wednesday night.

“It feels awesome,” said veteran REDS forward James McEwan (Chatham, ON), named Subway Player of the Game. “We haven’t really been down before, in this early part of the season, so it was good. A little bit of adversity for us to learn from and have a little bit of a fire under our butts. I thought we did a really good job answering the bell during the third.”

The game was played before 1710 fully-vaccinated and masked fans at Fredericton’s Aitken Centre.

The visitors were first to get on the scoreboard when Peyton Hoyt (Fredericton, NB) converted a one-timer on a pass from Mason McCarty (Blackie, AB) at 13:35 of the opening period.

The teams played through a scoreless second period, but it wasn’t without scoring opportunities.

Just before the eight-minute mark, UNB’s Rylan Parenteau (Saskatoon, SK) made a sprawling save on a Jack Flaman (Vibank, SK) shot from point-blank range to hold the Acadia lead to just a goal.

Logan Flodell (Regina, SK) made an equally impressive save at 13:57, with UNB working a power-play. Moments later, he got some help from defenceman Reilly Webb (Stoney Creek, ON), who got a piece of Brady Gilmour’s (Grafton, ON) shot that was destined for the back of the net.

The two teams went to the second intermission with Acadia in front 1-0.

Cue the REDS scoring explosion.

UNB finally got to Flodell at 7:08 of the third, when James Phelan (Laval, QC) swept across the front of the net and slid the puck past the Axemen netminder.

Four minutes later, McEwan broke down the left wing, crossed in front of the Acadia net and lifted a back-hand shot over Flodell to give UNB the lead.

Less than a minute after McEwan’s goal, Jason Willms (Kitchener, ON) scored his first AUS goal to put UNB up 3-1.

The REDS were then forced to kill a double-minor penalty assessed to McEwan. A deflated Axemen squad could not muster a shot during the power-play.

Nicolas Guay (Chateauguay, QC) added an empty net goal to make the final score 4-1.

“The third period, we pride ourselves in it and we know it’s our best period and the guys had the urgency of getting pucks to the net, everybody was going to the net and I think it was about time that somebody would bang one in and James Phelan got us going,” said McEwan. “Lucky enough, we had three more to pot and we were so solid in the back end, everybody really contributed.”

The REDS outshot the Axemen 44-14, but Acadia controlled the game for the first 40 minutes.

“I thought we played really well in the first and the second,” said Hoyt, in his first season with the Axemen. “Then, you know how hockey is, you can get a couple of bounces and it can change just like that, but I thought the team played really well and I think we’ll just get better for the next game coming up on Friday.”

“It felt great,” said REDS defenceman Ross MacDougall (St. Stephen, NB). He spent three seasons with the Axemen, but is now pursuing a Masters degree at UNB. “I thought we played well all game, it was just a matter of time before we beat ’em. Flodell, obviously, had a great game. It was nice to finally break through and get a couple on him.”

With the win, the REDS are now 3-and-0. The Axemen fall to 1-and-2.

UNB now awaits a Friday night visit by the Saint Mary’s Huskies. Game time is 7:00pm.

The Axemen return home and will host Moncton that same night.

 

RECAP BY: Andy Campbell/UNB Athletics

PHOTOS BY: James West/for UNB Athletics