Prince George, BC — The Cariboo Cougars hit the 20 win mark on the season with a 7-3 win at home over the North Island Silvertips Saturday.

It was a special game for Cougar forward Eli Jarvis who scored twice and added an assist in his 100th game with the team.

It was a slow start for the Cats who managed a relatively low five shots on Silvertips goaltender Liam Giroux through the first half of the opening frame. But after failing to execute on their first power play of the game, the Cougars connected late on their second attempt as Jarvis scored his 11th of the season from Ryan Forbes and Logan Styler to open scoring. Just over a minute later, Styler made it a 2-0 Cougar lead as the Cats outshot the visitors 19-8 through 20 minutes.

The Silvertips got on the board early in the second as Patrick Bajkov got an unassisted marker to pull within one. But that’s the closest North Island would come. Braiden Epp scored back to back goals three and a half minutes apart midway through the frame to make it a 4-1 game.

Liam Blackburn got his 17th of the season 91 seconds into the third from Epp while Scott Cullen scored his second of the season at the 12:17 mark to go up 6-1. Jarvis then scored his second of the game with four and a half minutes left before the Silvertips added two late ones, including one with 0.8 seconds on the clock.

Nathan Warren made an impressive 36 saves for his 14th win of the season, eclipsing his total from last year. The Cougars outshot the Silvertips 51-39 going 1/4 on the power play and killing off all four penalties against.

Blackburn finished with four points, leapfrogging into second place in league scoring with 49 points on the year. Styler and Epp each had a three point game while defenceman Jordan Low earned his first assist as a Cougar playing as a call-up for the injured Bryan Allbee.

The game was also the first for defenceman Cole Slaney and forward Keith Redden playing as affiliates from the bantam tier 3 Quesnel Thunder.

The Cougars record now stands at 20-7, four points back of the idle Okanagan Rockets and eight back of the leading NW Giants. The Cats go for the season series sweep of the Silvertips Sunday morning at 10:15am.