Surrey, B.C. – For the first time this season, the Surrey Eagles hosted a team inside the South Surrey Arena. The result was an emphatic 6-0 win against the visiting Langley Rivermen to improve their record to 4-3 in their 2020 British Columbia Hockey League exhibition season.
In a game which saw Surrey score goals in bunches, the first star of the game was yet again Tommy Scarfone. The Montreal, Quebec native made 33 saves to record his 2nd straight shutout, and improve to 4-1 in the pre-season. Again, when asked about what Eagles Head Coach Cam Keith liked about his team’s game, he didn’t shy away from praising his goaltender. “Tommy Scarfone, maybe that’s an obvious call but we gotta keep going back to a guy who makes us look a lot better. Sometimes our d-zone gets scrambled and he calms things down. He continues to make big saves, and he’s amazing.”
While Scarfone was the first thing which came to the coach’s mind, there was a lot to like in a game where Surrey scored in bunches. 2 goals under a minute apart from Holden Katzalay and Buddy Johnson made it 2-0 after the 1st period. Then in a 2:54 second stretch in the 2nd period, Christian Fitzgerald, Michael Abgrall, Kieran O’Hearn, and Katzalay all scored to make it 6-0 by the 14 minute mark of the middle frame. Surrey never looked back, and coasted through the 3rd period to pick up the win.
It was a great night for Cam, who continued to praise the effort his group showed. “We had 4 lines which were contributing tonight. We were using each other, our defense was constantly active and pressing down on their breakout making it hard to generate speed in the neutral zone. Everyone was playing, it was a pleasure for the coaching staff. We made small adjustments, but didn’t need to touch on the effort level. Our guys played the right way tonight.”
It was a matter of time before Surrey exploded offensively, but Cam admitted it was nice to see the group finally find their scoring touch in a game. “We see it every day in practice, but it was nice to finally see it happen in game. This is the team we’ve built; we’ve built a team that’s hard to defend against because there’s so many different options due to how well we distribute and move the puck. We like to pass, and we finally found our chemistry and started to gel tonight. Our younger guys are finally starting to feel comfortable in their own skin and play the right way at the Jr. A level.”
Yet despite the win, Cam knows this team “has to continue to get better. We’re talking about being a championship contending team this year, so we have to limit the amount of times we tap ourselves on the back and keep going.”
The Eagles next game on the schedule is November 26, 2020 against the Langley Rivermen again, but this time it’ll be inside the George Preston Arena. Puck drop is slated for 7:15pm.
