The Prince George Cougars sport one of the best home-ice records in the Western Hockey League.
But they can’t seem to shake themselves out of mediocrity away from the friendly confines of CN Centre.
They lost another road game on Family Day afternoon Monday in Langley, and this one wasn’t pretty, a 7-2 defeat dished out by the Vancouver Giants.
The Cougars fell behind 3-0 in the second period and were chasing the game the rest of the way. Tyus Sparks, Adam Titlbach and Connor Levis found the net behind Cougars goalie Cooper Michaluk before Ben Riche got Prince George on the scoreboard with his 30th of the season just before the second intermission.
In the third period, Mazden Leslie of the Giants and Cougars forward Terik Parascak traded power-play goals, but it was all Giants the rest of the game. Sparks, Levis and Titlbach all scored again to complete the rout.
Titlbach also had a pair of assists for a four-point game. Prince George minor hockey product Cameron Schmidt set up two of the Giants’ goals.
Burke Hood stopped 34 of 32 shots. The Cougars were outshot 39-34.
The Cougars were coming off one of their biggest wins of the season when they beat the league-leading Everett Silvertips Saturday night in Prince George and they improved to 18-4-3-2 in home games – a .759 winning percentage. Only two teams – Calgary (.801) and Everett (.768) have been better on home ice.
But the Cats have lost more than they’ve won out of town (13-13-1-0) and they’ll need to get their road show tuned up this weekend in Victoria when they take on the BC Division-leading Royals Friday and Saturday.
The Silvertips did the Cougars a favour Monday when they beat the Royals 3-2 in Victoria. Defenceman Eric Jamieson scored all three goals for Everett.
The second-place Cougars (31-17-2-2) are five points behind the Royals (32-15-2-6) for the division lead. The Cougars have 14 regular season games left and the Royals are down to their last 12.
