Thunder dominates Mavericks

The Thunder’s previous six hockey games seemed like 185 minutes of statistical anomalies, but Wichita needed to prove that.

Shots haven’t been an issue – Wichita produced its six highest shot totals of the season since Nov. 9. But the Thunder won two of those games and never scored more than three goals, totaling 14 goals on 223 shots.

Saturday, the trend reversed as Wichita converted plenty of its 31 shots in a 6-0 win over Missouri.

The game was highlighted by five Thunder players delivering goals and a Tyler Bunz shutout in the goaltender’s first win at Intrust Bank Arena, as Wichita produced its finest all-around effort of the season.

“You can have nights like that,” Thunder coach Kevin McClelland said of Wichita’s recent inability to top three goals. “If you get against a hot goaltender, it doesn’t matter if you put 60 (shots), you’re going to have a hard time finding the back of the net more than once or twice.”

The Thunder’s best game was perhaps foreshadowed by Tuesday’s shootout loss at Tulsa, when Wichita outshot the Oilers 40-9 over the final two periods and overtime while only managing a regulation tie.

It was a familiar theme for Wichita, as it had shooting advantages of 42-28, 35-26 and 32-17 in losses this month. The Thunder has struggled to recover after sluggish first periods and found a correction for that Saturday that didn’t necessarily involve offense, but led to a barrage of it.

Wichita’s more physical players, such as Erick Lizon, Theo Peckham and Dan Milan, frequently attempted to goad Missouri players into fights, or at least prolonged-but-unorganized scuffles.

The Mavericks weren’t interested in playing a style for which they appeared overmatched, and when the Thunder discovered it possessed the physical edge, that turned into a psychological advantage that got the offense on track earlier than usual.

Danick Gauthier scored the first of his two goals – the second was a second-period buzzer-beater – on a power play eight minutes in.

“We’ve got some pretty big guys with Peckham and Lizon and Milan,” Bunz said. “Those guys are always going to be ready to fight for themselves or for someone else on the team. Other teams recognize that. I felt like they kind of shied away, and that kind of gave us a little more energy. It showed that we were more into it tonight than they were.”

The Thunder didn’t need a pronounced shot advantage Saturday because Bunz stopped every Missouri attempt.

Neither Bunz nor Tim Boron has emerged as the go-to goalie. Even though Bunz has a better goals-against average, their save percentages were almost identical before Saturday – .878 for Bunz and .876 for Boron.

Bunz may have established a foothold on the position at least for now, not just for the shutout, but for maintaining his sharpness even in a lopsided game.

As Bunz stayed locked in for the third period, his lead was followed by the Thunder skaters, who scored two goals in the third to establish Wichita’s season high in goals. The Thunder hadn’t scored more than four in a win.

The output came on the same day leading scorer Stephen Schultz decided to leave the Thunder to play in Germany.

“It’s one of those games where guys have fun with it,” Bunz said. “The hit total tonight was probably through the roof. We had a lot of Grade-A scoring chances and guys buried (them). We needed that, especially heading into Tulsa (Sunday). We didn’t have a good start there last time, but we ended up playing a solid game which led into tonight’s game.”

This story was originally published November 22, 2014 at 10:56 PM with the headline "Thunder dominates Mavericks."