Declan Riley / For MacEwan Athletics

EDMONTON – The Griffins were having NJAA'n of the Portage College Voyageurs this evening in a hard fought, goal and penalty-filled 5-3 win on Friday, in the second home appearance for the Griffins in 2018.

Brett Njaa led the Griffins with a pair of goals as they improved to 11-6-0 on the season and remained undefeated at home this semester.

"Yeah, it's good. I was playing with some good guys tonight and they gave me some good passes and good looks," said Njaa, who bagged the game-winning goal late in the second period, and now has eight on the season.

Portage opened the scoring with a breakaway goal from Cody Livingstone just a minute into the game.

Though scoreless for the remainder of the first period, the Griffins battled hard with notable defensive play by netminder Chris Wray, standing tall in the crease, and forward Dallas Smith, who levelled a Voyageur on the blueline near the end of the period, giving his team a spark.

The Griffins opened the second period strong, full of offence and fire.

When asked about what type of message he had for the young men in the first intermission, interim head coach Michael Ringrose said: "There were a couple of plays where I thought we were casual and it ended up costing us on the first goal against, but also a couple of other opportunities against that we didn't need to give up, so the message was to tighten up."

Taylor Mulder tied the game 4:14 into the second, shovelling the puck in the net from in tight.

Shortly after, one of the Voyageur players was hit into the boards, with the rest of his line mates taking issue with the play, leading to a scrum and multiple penalties being assessed.

Later, the Griffins found themselves with too many men skating the ice, resulting in a Portage power-play that led to a goal from Connor Vermeulen at 5:40.

Following Portage's second goal of the game, the Griffins switched goalies, pulling Wray and activating Marc-Oliver Daigle for battle.

Looking to tie the game, the Griffins pushed harder and eventually the Voyageurs cracked. With 8:52 left in the second period, Njaa scored his first of the contest off a sharp angle shot on the powerplay.

Just over two minutes later, the Griffins took the lead with a powerplay snipe from Sean McTavish in the slot – his third of the season.

But the resilient Voyageurs tied the game back up just over a minute later when Gael Lubwele scored his team-leading eight of the season.

Njaa, however, was not having any of the tie game nonsense, and took it upon himself to gift the Griffins with the lead with 4:22 left the second. Using a wrist shot from the circle for his second of the game, he gave the Griffins a lead they wouldn't relinquish.

With an early third-period goal, up high from Stefan Danielson – his first of the season – MacEwan extended its lead to 5-3.

Though, the Griffins were done scoring for the night, quickly into the third, the strong play of Daigle was the difference in protecting the lead and preserving the win. He finished with 10 saves on 11 shots. Wray had seven on nine.

Voyageurs goalie Ben Dennis, named player of the game for Portage, had 41 saves. Tyler Mrkonjic earned the honour for the Griffins with three assists.

Portage falls to 2-13-1-1. The teams will meet on Saturday in Lac La Biche (7 p.m.).