Phillips fires home four in victorious Thunder debut

The Langley Thunder celebrate a first-period goal during the team's season-opening 13-11 win over the Burnaby Lakers in Western Lacrosse Association action at Langley Events Centre on May 21. Ryan Molag photo

In his Langley Thunder debut, Jon Phillips quickly demonstrated to his new teammates just what he can do.

Phillips scored four goals – including the game-winner with under two minutes to play – as part of a six-point game in his team’s 13-11 season-opening victory over the Burnaby Lakers on Wednesday night at Langley Events Centre in Western Lacrosse Association action.

“Me and (Kyle) Brunsch made eye contact across the floor, and he just passed it at the perfect time and the seal from (Nathan Lam) was great. I was lucky enough to get a good shot off short side,” Phillips described.

Phillips was an off-season acquisition from Nanaimo as Langley re-tooled ahead of the 2025 campaign. And while he may be new to Langley, Phillips said his familiarity with some of the existing players made his debut easier.

“I have played with a couple of the guys at different levels, so that always helps,” he said.

Langley coach Ian Poole liked his team’s fast start – they never trailed in the game – and with several new faces, was impressed by their battle level. He also credited their veteran leadership in captain Connor Robinson, Chase Scanlan and Phillips.

“Those guys are top-notch players and very good at calming the game down,” Poole said. “It is really nice to have them to be able to settle these young guys down and let them feed off of that (calmness).”

Aside from a few returnees, the Thunder defensive corps is relatively new to both the team and the WLA.

“We have some gritty young guys who are new to the league, but they have the work ethic and no-quit mentality and that’s what we are asking for on defence: we want guys that are going to lay it on the line,” Poole said.

“Today, we had a lot of bumps and bruises and blocked shots. Did we make mistakes, yes, but a lot of is correctable and we are going to keep working on it.”

Stat Leaders

Scanlan added a pair of goals and four assists to match Phillips’ six-point effort while Robinson had two goals and two assists. Brunsch and Lam each had a goal and two helpers with Nathaniel Kozevnikov, Toru Morimatsu and Kordell Primus scoring a goal apiece. Caleb Khan finished with 39 saves as the Thunder were outshot 50-49.

The Lakers’ Silas Richmond (3-4), Ben McDonald (3-4) and Thomas Vela (3-1) each had hat tricks for their team with Keegan Melenychuk making 36 saves.

The Thunder are back in action on May 28 (7:00pm) when they host the Nanaimo Timbermen at Langley Events Centre.

Tickets for home games may be purchased at www.langleythunder.com/buy-tickets

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