The York University Lions men's hockey team defeated the cross-town rival University of Toronto Varsity Blues Saturday night (Oct. 31) by a score of 4-2 on home ice at Canlan Ice Sports.
 
The Lions controlled the game from the get go due in part to the early advantage of the Varsity Blues being called for delay of game as they were late to come out of the dressing room, sending the Lions on the power play. With the momentum from the early odd-man advantage, the Lions seemed to play with constant pressure in the opposing zone.
 
Seven minutes into the first period Derek Sheppard (Ajax, Ont.) broke into Varsity Blues territory and with an inside hesitation followed by an outside move, went bar down on Blues goaltender Brett Willows to break the scoreless game. Assists were from Tyler McGee (Timmins, Ont.) and Greg Milner (Watford, Ont.).
 
A few minutes after the Lions took the lead the Varsity Blues got on the board when a pass from the corner from Ryan Kirkup found its way onto the stick of Dean Klomp and he potted it past Chris Perugini (King City, Ont.) to tie the game up at ones.
 
The second period was played for the majority of the time in the Blues zone. After a U of T penalty the Lions looked to capitalize on the power play, and after only a few clicks off the penalty, Milner pounced on a rebound and poked it by the sprawled Willows to regain the lead at 2-1, which is how the second period ended.
 
The Lions and Varsity Blues both had a total of seven power plays on the night. As the Blues were down by one goal they threw everything they had at the Lions in the third, and eventually with five minutes remaining Charlie Connell received a pass in the slot which managed to sneak past Perugini to tie the game.
 
However, less than one minute after the equalizer, the trio of Justin Larson (Buckhorn, Ont.), Sheppard and Milner played the puck around from in close and Larson finished to give the Lions the lead once again.
 
The Lions took a boarding penalty later in the frame but managed to kill it off, followed by an empty net goal from Trevor Petersen (Thornhill, Ont.) with 16 seconds left on the clock to seal the game and improve to an impressive 5-1-1 on the season.
 
They will look to add to their win total on Friday night (Nov. 6) when the Lions take on the RMC Paladins in Kingston, Ont.