The Prince George Spruce Kings’ shootout misery continued Wednesday night in a 4-3 loss to the visiting West Kelowna Warriors.
Tyler Cristall ended the shootout with a backhand deke, lifting the puck high over the shoulder of goalie Aaron Trotter in the fourth round of the shootout, disappointing Kings’ fans in the crowd of 641 in attendance at Rolling Mix Concrete Arena.
Shootouts have been kryptonite to the Spruce Kings this season. The latest debacle marked the seventh consecutive time this season they’ve come out on the short end of the stick (they’re 1-7 in shootouts this season) and that didn’t sit well with general manager Mike Hawes, who watched his team blow a two-goal lead in the third period while falling to their BCHL Interior Conference rivals.
“I don’t know if it’s a confidence issue but certainly we’re snakebit when it comes to extra time and the shootout and it came back to bit us tonight,” said Hawes. “More importantly, when you have a 3-1 lead at home going into the third period you expect to come away with the two points and the boys definitely need to do some soul-searching about their effort there in the third period.”
The Kings were outshot 13-3 in the third and gave up two goals – the first, a spectacular rink-length rush from left winger Nick Roukounakis, the second, a power-play shot from the top of the right circle from Tyler Rubin with less than two minutes left in regulation time.
“That was totally unacceptable, we need our veteran guys to be much better in that third than they were,” said Hawes. “We can’t sit back the way we did in the third period. It came back to bite us for sure, and we were a little bit undisciplined and it cost us.”
After getting outshot 14-3 in the opening period, the Warriors held a 30-10 advantage for the next 45 minutes, including a 4-0 edge in the five-minute overtime. Total shots favoured the Warriors 35-24.
Felix Trudeau put the visitors ahead 1-0 with a power-play goal eight minutes in, his 26th goal of the season. A three-goal second period gave the Spruce Kings the lead. Rowan Miller surprised the Warriors when centre Nick Rheaume chipped the puck ahead on an offensive-zone face-off and Miller finished with a deke on goalie Johnny Derrick.
Forty-five seconds later, defenceman Nick Wright joined Rheaume and Simon Labelle as the trailer on a 2-on-2 and scored his second goal of the season. Then, near the end of the second period Ty Gagno took a drop from Evan Fedele and wired his shot into the net for a 3-1 lead.
The Warriors gained some momentum from back-to-back penalties to the Kings midway through the third period, which generated extended zone time controlling the puck in the offensive end. The Kings had a chance while shorthanded to go two goals up with 2:37 left in the third when Miller was awarded a penalty shot as he tried to outrace Tyson Jugnauth while taking the puck to the net. But Derrick turned aside Miller on the penalty shot. Less than a minute later, Rubin’s blast tied the game.
The Warriors had the best chances to end it in overtime. In addition to their four shots on goal, Trudeau missed a wide-open net when the puck hopped over his tick in the opening minute and Christophe Farmer clanged the top-corner goalpost two minutes into OT.
Kings captain Kolton Cousins scored in the second round of the shootout, but the third West Kelowna shooter, Chase Dafoe, beat Trotter with a high shot, which gave Cristall’s his chance to end it.
West Kelowna improves its fourth-place record to 27-15-1-0-0, 640 winning percentage, while the Spruce Kings remained third with a record of 25-10-3-7-0, .667.
The Kings are back on home ice this weekend to host the Salmon Arm Silverbacks Friday and Saturday at RMCA. Prince George is just five points behind the second-place Silverbacks and the Kings have won three of the four games of the season series (all in Salmon Arm).
Defenceman Dylan Schives will return to the Kings’ lineup after sitting out the last two games for a hit from behind in Saturday’s 3-2 win in Penticton.
