Giftopoulos nets a pair in loss

Wolfville, N.S. – The Acadia Axemen were unable to pull off the comeback, as the Axemen (2-2) dropped their final game of the two game Homecoming weekend, 5-3 to the StFX X-Men (3-1).

The X-Men were quick to get on the board, with third year forward and Subway First Star of the Night, Kristoff Kontos (Penetanguishene, Ont.), scoring on the team’s first shot of the night.

Kontos took a cross ice pass from second year forward, Holden Cook (Oshawa, Ont.), to slide the puck under the right pad of Axemen goaltender, Devon Williams (Detroit, Michigan).

The X-Men bookended the period with only 6.4 seconds left to play. Rookie forward Bryson Cianfrone, (Stoney Creek, Ont.) curled in front of the net and waited out a sprawling Williams, before sliding it under Williams’ glove at the side of the net to give StFX a 2-0 advantage.

Despite leading in shots 15-6, the Axemen were unable to find the back of the net in the first frame.

Once again the X-Men opened the scoring in the second period, with second year forward Mark Tremaine (Dartmouth, N.S.) scooping the puck up in an offensive zone faceoff and firing it low blocker side past Williams, to put the X-Men up 3-0.

Acadia finally responded with a hard wrist shot at the top of the left faceoff dot from second year defenseman Liam Maaskant (Clinton, Ont.), to cut the X-Men lead to 3-1. Just like the period before, the X-Men scored within the last minute of the second, when a wide open Holden Cook (Oshawa, Ont.) fired a wrist shot in tight, beating Williams low glove side.Read more »

Farrell does it again in OT!

The Acadia Axemen kicked off the Acadia Homecoming Weekend with a 3-2 overtime win over the Dalhousie Tigers on Friday night at the Andrew H. McCain Arena in Wolfville. The Axemen would have preferred it not take longer than regulation time, but when Dal tied the game with less than 1 minute to play, the desired script needed to change.

The teams battled to a scoreless opening period that featured steady goaltending from Dal’s Corbin Boes and Acadia’s first year netminder Devin Williams. Dal was able to block many shots, keeping them from getting through to Boes which made his job easier in goal as both team registered 9 shots on goal a piece.

The second period saw the Axemen capitalize midway through the frame when Michael Clarke notched his second goal of the young season, with the assists going to Remy Giftopoulos & Chance Braid. The 1-0 lead held up until the 17:06 mark when Acadia freshman Nick Betz made a great play as he made a stop and spin pass on the tape of Chance Braid who deposited the puck into the net past a fallen Boes to put the Axemen up by two goals. The Axemen outshot the Tigers 16-7 in the second period and the game play was heavily controlled by Acadia.

The third period was going according to the Axemen plan until an errand pass through the middle by the Acadia defence, led to Colton Parsons putting the Tigers on the board and cutting the Axemen lead to one. Acadia continued to control the game and looked to have the win when they broke across the Dalhousie blue line on a 3 on 1, with an empty Dalhousie net, but as second year forward Kyle Farrell went to pass the puck to an open teammate for the tap in, his stick broke and the Dal defenceman Andrew Rieder fed the puck up to Colton Parsons, who then found Alex Pawelczyk open to put the puck past Acadia’s netminder Williams, to even the score at 2 with just :54 seconds to play in the third.Read more »

Childerley scores for Acadia in 2^nd straight game

The Acadia Axemen travelled to Antigonish on Saturday night to face the StFX X-Men, but the result they left with wasn’t what they had hoped for. On the strength of three powerplay goals, StFX dropped Acadia by a 4-1 score.

Acadia started the game off well, with Brendan Childerley one timing home a shot, on a nice feed from Chance Braid to put the Axemen up 1-0 at 9:28 of the opening frame. That was the only scoring play of the period and actually held up until nearly midway through the second period.

At 8:42 of the second, Jagger Dirk was able to put a puck past first year Axemen netminder Devin Williams to tie the game at one on the powerplay. Shortly after that, Williams was forced to leave the game as he was injured on a collision in front of the Acadia net. Williams was down on the ice for several minutes before getting to his feet on his own power and heading to the dressing room. Robert Steeves spelled his relief, but was beaten with a shot on the powerplay just minutes later as Holden Cook made it 2-1 StFX.

The Axemen opened up the third period on the powerplay hoping they could find the equalizer, but after not taking advantage, StFX turned the tides and scored their third goal of the night, as Bryson Cianfrone tipped home a Cole MacDonald shot from the point that beat a screen Steeves to make it 3-1.Read more »

4 different Axemen tally to lead the way

It was a game of firsts for many of the Axemen tonight. In their first home game of the regular season, Acadia started first year netminder Devin Williams in goal, and he achieved his first win. Brendan Childerley, who transferred from St Thomas after 3 years, suited up in his first regular season game as an Axemen, and was first star of the game,  and many other first year Axemen got a taste of AUS regular season hockey and more than held their own in the team’s first win of the season.

The Axemen got on the board first when Brendan Childerley picked up a bad rebound off the pad of Huskies netminder Cole Cheveldave and deposited it into the back of the net; Geoff Schemitsch and Matthew Pufahl picked up assists on the goal at 11:08. Saint Mary’s responded with under a minute to play in the opening frame when Taylor Burke snuck a puck past Acadia’s rookie netminder Williams, with assists going to Stephen Johnson and Connor McGlynn.

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