Friday night in Prince George, the Prince George Cougars dropped a 5-2 score to the Tri-City Americans. Beau McCue, Tyler Wotherspoon and Michael Rasmussen each had two points for the visitors while Jesse Gabrielle and Jansen Harkins responded with goals for Prince George.  Americans goaltender Evan Sarthou turned aside 31 of the 33 shots he faced, 17 of which came in the second period.

Late in the first period the Cougars drew first blood when Jesse Gabrielle raced in on a two-on-one rush. Gabrielle kept the puck down the left wing side, made a move to the middle and beat Evan Sarthou with a wrist shot. For Gabrielle it was his fourth of the season and his third goal in as many games.

The lead was short lived though as just over two minutes later Tri-City responded on a power play. Parker Bowles took a Beau McCue pass in the slot and beat Mack Shields (who played in his 100^th career regular season game) with a quick shot to tie the game at one.

A few shifts later the Cougars thought they had taken a 2-1 lead when Brogan O’Brien danced by the Ams defender and appeared to stuff the puck past the right pad of Sarthou on a forehand deke, but the referee ruled no goal and the game remained tied with the shots tied 10-10.

28 seconds into the second Tri-City took the lead when Brandon Carlo’s point shot made its way past Shields and in. The very next shift the Cougars (again) had a goal disallowed. Brogan O’Brien, Brad Morrison and Bartek Bison nearly combined on the equalizing goal, but Evan Sarthou kicked out his left pad and robbed Bison from in close. Taylor Vickerman then increased the Ams lead to 3-1 when he knocked home a Juuso Valimaki rebound on a power play at the 3:47 mark.

The rest of period belonged to Evan Sarthou who was terrific in the Tri-City net making clutch stops off of Jansen Harkins, Chase Witala and Jesse Gabrielle. In total he faced 17 shots and stopped them all. After two the Cougars held a 27-16 edge in shots, but trailed 3-1.

After killing off three straight penalties to start the third, Jansen Harkins got the Cougars back within a goal when he knocked home his first of the season off a Tate Olson rebound at the 10:51 mark of the second, but unfortunately for the Cougars that’s as close as they’d come.

Kyle Olson made it 4-2 for Tri-City just over two minutes later, and at the 17:03 mark of the third Beau McCue sealed the victory for the visitors with his fourth of the season.

The final shots were 33-25 favoring the Cougars who finished the night zero-for-four on the power play. Tri-City went two-for-five on their chances.

Next up for the Cougars (1-3): A rematch with the same Tri-City (3-1-1-0) squad,  7 pm tonight at the CN Centre.