Giants Edge Cougars 6-5.
Friday night in Vancouver, the Prince George Cougars fell 6-5 to the Vancouver Giants at the Pacific Coliseum. Dominik Volek had a goal and an assist for Vancouver while Marc McNulty led the way with a goal and two assists for Prince George. At one point the Cougars trailed 5-2, but managed to inch back within one on two different occasions.
Vancouver wasted little time in getting the offense started. Just 49 seconds in, Tim Traber pounced on a Dalton Thrower rebound and tucked it past Ty Edmonds for his ninth of the season.
Prince George answered at the 6:13 mark when Marc McNulty and Jansen Harkins combined for a two-on-one goal. Brad Morrison made the pass up ice to Harkins who took off beside McNulty. Harkins slid the pass across to McNulty who made no mistake up high for his eighth goal of the season.
18 seconds later the Cougars took the lead when Tate Olson snuck a shot through from the left point. For Olson it was his first career goal in the WHL and it gave the Cougars a very brief 2-1 lead.
Less than a minute later, Vancouver responded with the equalizer. Joel Hamilton snuck into the slot and buried a Thomas Foster pass for his fifth of the season. Hamilton’s goal kicked off a stretch of four goals in five minutes and two seconds for Vancouver.
15 seconds after the Hamilton goal, Dominik Volek skated across the blueline and beat Edmonds to the blocker side for his 16th of the season which gave Vancouver a lead that they wouldn’t relinquish.
Ty Ronning extended Vancouver’s lead to 4-2 at the 10:47 mark of the period. Ronning’s fourth of the season spelt the end of the night for Edmonds who was pulled after allowing four goals on 12 shots faced.
In came 19-year-old Adam Beukeboom who was acquired just yesterday from the Giants in a pre-deadline deal. He was rudely greeted with a Mason Geertsen goal at 12:25, which extended Vancouver’s lead to 5-2.
From there though, Beukeboom was able to settle down, and finished with 25 saves on 27 shots faced.
Vancouver outshot Prince George 18-8 in the first period and appeared to be in full control.
Early in the second the Cougars were given a 1:20 worth of five-on-three power play time, and were able to take advantage. Zach Pochiro snuck beside the Giants net, and converted off a Troy Bourke pass for his 17th of the season.
Less than three minutes later Klarc Wilson snuck through the Giants defense after a faceoff victory and deked out Rathjen for his 17th goal in 2013-2014. And all of a sudden a 5-2 deficit was now at 5-4.
The Cougars outshot the Giants 11-7 in the second, and went into the third with some positive momentum.
That quickly faded 42 seconds into the period when Jackson Houck snuck a low shot past Beukeboom off a set faceoff play, which helped restore Vancouver’s two-goal advantage.
Klarc Wilson made it 6-5 with a late goal with the Cougars net empty, but the Cougars comeback bid would fall a goal short.
Prince George (16-23-2-4) finished one-for-four on the power play and killed off their lone penalty against.
Luckily for the Cougars, the Tri-City Americans also lost, which means that the Cougars are still just four points back of eighth place with 27 games now remaining in their regular season.
Next up, trips to Kamloops to battle the Blazers for a seventh time this season on Saturday.
Comments
OK Boys, enough is enough, gotta be really bad both on and off the ice to miss the playoff for so many years consecutively.
Eight out of the possible ten teams make it. Good gosh, many teams that were in rebuilt mode even got it, how the hell can the Cougars not get into the playoffs.
The Players need fan support, coming out to a half filled out will be a start but to get to this point, management / ownership must change . Maybe its time to put up the
FOR SALE sign. I bet you my pension plan, this team would be picked-up by a group of locals in no-time. PS – Rick, save yourself sales commission, let me know if your interested!
They can’t even get a sports writer to report the score accurately. It finished 6 – 4.
Sell the team? Never going to happen. That would put Rick’s daughter and son-in-law on the EI line. Rick has scoffed at offers in the past.
When I made my comment above I was initially referring to the title of the article. Then I read the full report and found this doozy….
“Klarc Wilson made it 6-5 with a late goal with the Cougars net empty, but the Cougars comeback bid would fall a goal short.”
That’s not an innocent mistake, that’s a complete fabrication. That never happened. Wilson scored at 7:01 of the second period. No Cougar got any goals after that time, and definitely not with the net empty.
PP- don’t rely on the box score…. Mr. Article is correct. You have to listen to the game. WHL mucked this one up. Score keeps went home early after it was 5-2 at end of the first. Sale?….. There is something happening, stay tuned. Ricks work is complete here so time to cash out.
walrus… fair enough if that is the fact. I’ve never seen a box score AND the score sheet both be inaccurate before.
Alas I wasn’t listening to this one. Too busy watching the ‘Nucks.
;)
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