January Vancouver Giant Report

With 45 games elapsed in the 2008-2009 WHL regular season, the Vancouver Giants lead the BC Division with an impressive 38-4-0-3 record.  Surprisingly, this is only good enough for second overall in the WHL with 79 pts. The Calgary Hitmen have 83 pts but they have played 5 more games than Vancouver.

Saturday night, the Giants were in Red Deer to face the Rebels, and they came out with a 9-3 victory and last night they wrapped up their longest road trip of the season in Kelowna versus the Rockets. The Giants came out on top of that match-up as well, outscoring the Rockets 6-4. Evander Kane, a member of Canada’s junior team that recently won the gold medal, posted a hat trick and his teammate, WHL leading scorer Casey Pierro-Zabotel, had a goal and 3 assists. With 57 assists for the year Pierro-Zabotel has set a new franchise record for helpers in a single season, and we are only 45 games through.

Evander Kane

It’s been a dream season for the 20 year old native of Kamloops, who is in his second season with the Giants. Last season in 49 games Pierro-Zabotel had 19 goals, 29 assists and 46 points in 49 games. So far in this season's 45 games, he has 25 goals and 57 assists for 82 points - 11 ahead of his closest competitor, Justin Bernhardt of the Prince Albert Raiders. Pierro-Zabotel is a draft pick of the Pittsburgh Penguins.

The Giants will hope to pick up where they left off tomorrow night at the Pacific Coliseum against the Kamloops Blazers. The puck drops at 7:30.