A strong start was a key ingredient for the Virden Oil Capitals on Thursday night as they were able to come away with a 5-1 win over the Waywayseecappo Wolverines in front of more than 960 fans at Tundra Oil and Gas Place.
A good first shift by the Oil Capitals after the puck was dropped to start the game set the tone as Braden Billaney scored 1:27 into the contest to make it 1-0 Virden.
“We did a lot of good things tonight,” said head coach and GM Troy Leslie. “It’s all about that consistent effort. That’s just a good habit to have – just making sure you have a game plan and your team sticks to it and is consistent that way.”
Dylan Thiessen scored his fourth of the season on a powerplay just a few minutes later before Adam Withers responded for Wayway at the 9:17 mark of the first period. Tanner Andrew would later reply to give Virden a two-goal cushion after 20 minutes of play.
Billaney scored his second of the game and third of the season at the 5:31 mark of the second to make it 4-1 Virden before Tyler Kirkup netted his fifth tally of the year near the midway mark of the period.
“He was good. He was solid,” Leslie said of Billaney’s two-goal night. “He was all over the place. He’s physical and he’s not afraid to go into the hard areas. We look forward to more of that kind of play from him going forward.”
After an overall solid performance tonight, Leslie says his team is still a work in progress.
“Obviously when you get into a third period of a game like that and you have a comfortable lead, you want to make sure that you’re doing good things near the end of the game because that can carry over to your next one and we have a tough one with Winkler coming up,” Leslie concluded.
Riley McVeigh turned aside 26 of 27 shots to pick up his league leading seventh win of the season between the pipes for Virden. Meanwhile, Wolverines netminder Ethan Peterson stopped 46 of 51 shots in the loss for Wayway.
Next up for the Oil Caps is another home game on Sunday night against the Winkler Flyers. Game time is 7:00 p.m.