Friday night in Kennewick, WA the Prince George Cougars spoiled the Tri-City Americans Teddy Bear Toss party. Todd Fiddler had two goals and an assist, which paced the Cougars to a 5-1 victory over the Tri-City Americans. Four other Cougars had two-point games and Ty Edmonds made 31 saves for his 10th victory of the season.

Heading into Friday’s game, Todd Fiddler was riding a seven game point streak. He wasted little time in extending that streak when he popped home a shot from the high slot at 4:46 of the first period. For Fiddler it was his 13th goal of the season, and 11th since joining the Cougars.

Tri-City mounted a strong response, but Ty Edmonds turned aside all 15 shots he faced in the first period to keep his team ahead.

Late in the first, the Cougars padded their lead when Klarc Wilson wired home his ninth of the season from the top of the left circle on a power play. Troy Bourke made a great stickhandling move at the blueline to keep the play alive, and then he fed Wilson at the side. Todd Fiddler added an assist for his second point of the night.

Early in the second Tri-City countered with their first and only goal of the game. Connor Rankin took a pass beside the Cougars goal and tried to wrap it around. Edmonds stopped his first attempt, but Rankin banged home his own rebound for his 12th of the season.

Down came the teddy bears, and the frenzied Tri-City crowd was fired up. Unfortunately for the home crowd they would soon be silenced.

Todd Fiddler knocked home a Klarc Wilson rebound on a five-on-three power play to restore the Cougars two goal lead. Then Jansen Harkins made it 4-1 a few minutes later after he passed the puck to himself off the backboards, snuck past the defender and roofed one over the right shoulder on Eric Comrie for his fifth of the season. Harkins’ goal was assisted by Tyler Mrkonjic and Alex Forsberg.

Tri-City pushed back in the final half of the second, but Ty Edmonds was strong when called upon. His best save of the second came off a Lukas Nickles shorthanded breakaway.

Early in the third the Cougars had to kill of a Tri-City power play, and did so thanks to some excellent shot blocking from both Peter Kosterman and Sam Ruopp.

Tri-City controlled the play territorially for a majority of the third, but Edmonds continued to quell the Tri-City shooters.

On a late Cougars power play, Marcus Messier stole the puck at the Cougars line and raced in alone on Edmonds but was checked off the puck from behind by Joe Carvalho.

The referees awarded Messier a penalty shot, but he was thwarted by Edmonds who stopped the five-hole attempt with his stick.

Aaron Macklin would add a late power play for the Cougars in the final stages of the game to complete the 5-1 victory.

Despite being outshot 32-26, the Cougars were definitely the more opportunistic team. Prince George went three-for-six on the power play and killed off all four of Tri-City’s power play attempts.

Todd Fiddler led the way with three points, but Klarc Wilson, Troy Bourke, Jansen Harkins, and Tyler Mrkonjic all had two point games.

The win improves the Cougars record to 13-17-2-3 and inches them back within six points of eighth place in the Western Conference standings. Tomorrow night the Cougars will look to extend their winning streak in Spokane against the Chiefs.