The Vancouver Warriors won double header games for the first time in franchise history, and they did it with patience and grit.
Over the weekend, Vancouver beat the Las Vegas Desert Dogs 14-10 for the series sweep and eclipsed the San Diego Seals 9-7. The Warriors got an early lead against Las Vegas and never trailed, and they took a late lead against the Seals and made clutch plays to come out of the weekend with two wins.
Warriors’ Head Coach and GM Curt Malawsky said his team was determined to come away with two wins this weekend, and he was proud of their effort from Friday through Sunday.
“Our guys got a couple big wins this weekend,” Malawsky said. “The season is for lessons learned, and we're learning lessons as we go along – good or bad.”
The Warriors took care of business on the defensive end in both games, shutting out the Desert Dogs in the third quarter on Friday night and eliminating second chances against the Seals.
“I thought we did a good job of breaking their press. We got to the middle of the floor when we needed to. It’s a game of adjustments, you’ve got to always be evolving as you're going along,” Malawsky said after the win against the Seals.
“Our players had a lot of drive this weekend and they joked in the room, ‘You want to have fun, you’ve got to win two’ and they did. It's a great job.”
The Warriors were down 4-2 at halftime against the Seals, but they showed resilience to battle back.
“The guys just stayed in the fight; it was the best part. We changed some things at the half, but as far as mindset and the positivity on the bench, that was player-driven. It was amazing. They kept on saying, ‘We're not tired, keep grinding five at a time’. It was their mental fortitude that pushed us over the top and obviously, Christian [Del Bianco] was absolutely amazing in the second half,” Malawksy said.
Del Bianco turned aside 85 of 102 shots he faced, for an 0.833 save percentage for the weekend. Delbs made 44 saves against San Diego, and 23 of those were in the second half. He also had two assists against the Seals – both to Curtis Dickson – and is now second all-time in scoring amongst NLL goaltenders with 108 assists, passing Dallas Eliuk (107).
Warriors’ defenceman Steph Charbonneau shouldered most of the faceoff duties over the weekend and also scored his first goals of the season against San Diego. Charbonneau scored Vancouver’s first goal against the Seals and then the game-tying goal to start the fourth quarter. His second goal was also the second goal of the Warriors’ five-goal run to secure the win.
“What a teammate, first and foremost,” Malawsky said. “What a competitor; he's miserable to play against. He's super, super intelligent, he's got lacrosse IQ off the charts, and he's got a great competitive nature and had to sit in the circle and take so many faceoffs over the last two games, especially not being a faceoff guy is tough, and then to get up the floor, that's just sheer drive and will to get up there and stick those two shots, that's probably the turning point of the game.”
Charbonneau credited his opportunities in transition to his teammates.
“It starts with Delbs, the best passing goal in the league, probably the best goalie period in the league, starts with him, so just breaking up the floor,” Charbonneau said.
“Keegan's [Bal] on the other side of the ball on the first one, and he's yelling at me to shoot it. Jeff [Cornwall] was behind me on the second one, and he's yelling at me to take the shot. So, it's easy for me to make a decision.”
The Montreal native talked about the importance of every win.
“Wins in this league are hard to come by, especially getting two in a weekend, they're hard fought. It's a grind, so it's helpful, and down the stretch towards playoff time. It's going to come in handy to be higher up in the standings,” he said.
“We had each other's backs all night. Didn't get down on each other on the bench, stayed positive, stuck with it, and just battled for a full 60. It wasn't pretty, but we got it done.”
The leadership that comes with having such an experienced, veteran defence is invaluable. The penalty kill went 8-for-10 on the weekend and that helped bring the Warriors to the spot as the best team in the league on the short man with a 72% success rate.
“They're unreal. So, it's easy for us to stick together as a group and play those hard minutes when we've got those guys as our foundation," Charbonneau said.
The Warriors had 10 different scorers throughout the weekend. Keegan Bal led the Warriors with 13 points (6G, 7A), Jesse King recorded eight points (3G, 5A), Curtis Dickson and Adam Charalambides each had seven points (4G, 3A) and (3G, 4A) respectively.
With the win, the Warriors improve to 9-3 on the season and are on a three-game win streak. The Warriors are back at Rogers Arena for an all-Canadian matchup against the Toronto Rock on Friday, March 6th at 7:00 p.m. PT to celebrate Women in Sports Night.
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