by Glen Gibbs Peak Sports There is a heated race in the Coastal Conference for the four playoff spots at the end of the year and Powell River Kings are hoping their first loss at home won’t come back to haunt them.
After blanking Nanaimo 3-0 in the first game, Kings weren’t as prepared as they should have been for the rematch and consequently lost to the Clippers 4-2.
A large crowd of over 1,100 fans gathered at Hap Parker Arena on Friday where after a brief ceremony of remembrance they were treated to one of the best games of the year by the Kings.
Winning goaltender Jamie Phillips, who leads the entire BC Hockey League with a 1.77 goals against average, joined teammate Sean Maguire as the only netminders to record two shutouts.
He was supported by goals from Matt Scarth, Chris Williams and rookie James Neil with his first of
the year into an empty net.
Captain Williams said after the game, “we talked about trying to avoid those 10-minute letdowns we’ve had the past couple of weekends. We had one against Prince George that cost us the game and we had one against Cowichan Valley that sent the game into overtime so we really tried to play a complete 60-minute game.”
He scored the insurance goal for the Kings. “It’s always nice to have it because it’s really frustrating when you outplay a team and you’re only up by one and they get one back on you,” said Williams.
Assistant coach Chad van Diemen agreed with his captain. “It was a great effort all around,” he said, “with our forwards doing a great job in the offensive zone and our D did a good job of getting pucks out. We were down to five back there and everybody did a great job.”
The next night was a slightly different story however, when the Kings once again opened the scoring but suffered one of their 10-minute lapses.
After a scoreless first period, Daniel Schuler surprised the Clippers when he stripped a defenceman of the puck and deftly backhanded the puck over their goaltender at 2:52 of the second period.
Instead of sparking the Kings, however, his goal seemed to wake up the Clippers who answered 14 seconds later, and went on to score three more to lead 4-1 with less than half a period to play.
Kings had a glimmer of hope when Cohen Adair scored his team-leading 12th goal at 12:52 but the Clippers shut the door the rest of the way to hold on to a 4-2 win.
“A lot of guys weren’t prepared mentally to play a tough hockey game tonight,” said van Diemen. “We knew Nanaimo was going to come out hard to try and redeem themselves and they did. They played a great road game and did all the little things right and we didn’t.”
Kings will need to do all those same little things right this week when they take on the Clippers Wednesday, November 16 in Nanaimo and conference-leading Cowichan Valley Capitals on Thursday, November 17 in Duncan.
There will be no time to rest as they return to Powell River to host Coquitlam Express at 7:30 pm Friday, November 18.
DIVISION: Coastal Conference
TEAM GP W L T OTL PTS
Cowichan Valley 19 12 5 1 1 26
Surrey 19 11 5 0 3 25
Powell River 19 11 6 2 0 24
Nanaimo 19 10 6 0 3 23
Victoria 23 11 12 0 0 22
Alberni Valley 18 9 8 1 0 19
Coquitlam 19 8 8 1 2 19
Langley 19 6 13 0 0 12
