For just under 26 minutes, the Kluane Drillers kept it close in Thursday's playoff hockey game against Boston Pizza.

From there, however, the Hawks showed why they are the three-time defending champions in the Whitehorse Recreational Hockey League's A division.

The team posted seven unanswered goals in the second period, shellacking the opposition 8-1.

With the win, Boston Pizza took a 1-0 lead in the best of three series.

"Our team enjoys playing against Kluane," said Boston Pizza Forward Trevor Twardochleb. "They always come out with a good game against us. The whole year we have had close games It's not chippy, they are out to have fun and play hockey and have a few laughs."

Kluane, the 2008 B divisional champions, were missing a few key players for its opening playoff series. Most noticeably was its starting goaltender, but thankfully the team managed to pickup Terra Firma Muckers' Nathan Dumont.

Dumont, a forward, had just got off the ice after his team's 3-0 playoff win against the Whitehorse Midget Mustangs, but he was good to go in net after borrowing teammate Randy Cichon's goalie equipment.

The move to put Dumont in net immediately paid off for the Drillers and less than three minutes into the game, Kluane's substitute puck-stopper proved himself more than capable of handling the defending champs.

Dumont made his first big save on a Boston Pizza one-timer, which drew cheers from Kluane's bench and from up in the stands.

The Drillers, thanks in part to plenty of support between the pipes, broke the goose egg at 11:10.

The goal was put in by Tyler Murray, with assists going to Craig Hampton and Edwin Vanderkley.

Boston Pizza proved to be persistent and eventually slid on by Dumont, who looked unbeatable for the majority of the opening frame.

The goal was scored by Twardochleb on a quick wrist shot that found the top corner of the net with 6:26 left in the first.

Kluane came within a heartbeat of pulling ahead before the end of the first period, but unfortunately for the Drillers the bounce off Hawks goalie Brian Power went wide of the net.

However, in the second period, Boston Pizza looked more like the dynasty team that is going for a fourth straight title.

Five quick goals, scored in just over six minutes, broke the game wide open and secured the Hawks' win.

The scoring breakdown included Twardochleb, Lance Brown, who also finished with two goals, Jay Massie and Randy Merkel.

The Hawks added two more to its overall total before time expired on the clock. The team's remaining goals were put in by Derek Johnstone and Dean Mastrangelo.

Johnstone scored the final goal with 18 seconds left to cap a great Boston Pizza performance.

Twardochleb said he doesn't think the team is thinking about a fourth straight championships

"We are like everybody else," he said. "You use all those cliches where you just look at one series at a time. It would be nice to get back and have an opportunity to play for the fourth, but whatever happens, happens. We are just out to have fun and hopefully win."

He said because of it being a best-of-three series, it was an important game to win.

"It's hard battling back," Twardochleb said. "We are a team where we have a lot of guys in and out of town. So when we do have our guys together it's important for us to pull together a win because a week from now we could have four or five guys missing with shift work and guys traveling."

Drillers defenceman, Bud Arnold, said Boston Pizza is a really strong team.

"They had three lines out tonight and when they have three lines they are really hard to beat," he said. "We knew that, but we gave it everything we had. They just got ahead of us and we couldn't come back."

He credited Dumont's performance in net for one of the reasons it was so close early on.

"He made about 50 or 60 saves in the game, it was unreal," Arnold said about Dumont. "For a guy who plays forward on another team, just to come in cold like that and bail us out that was really helpful."

Arnold said Kluane will have some a couple more bodies in the line-up in Wednesday's rematch, which should help make it a more competitive game.

Boston Pizza finished the regular season in second place with a record of 25-9-2, while Kluane placed seventh with nine wins.

There was not a single penalty called against either team throughout the 44 minute playoff contest.

In Thursday's other recreational hockey league playoff contest, the Terra Firma Muckers downed the Whitehorse Midget Mustangs 3-0.

Dumont was one of the goal scorers, while the remaining two were Jeff Bono and Doug Cote.