KAMLOOPS – Last weekend the Blazers were in Victoria for a pair of games vs the Royals. They ended up losing both, but did play well and had 2-0 and 3-1 leads in the second game on Saturday. The special teams battle was won by the Royals as they went a combined 2-for-11 on the power play and scored a shorthanded goal the first night. Both overage goalies, Dylan Ferguson and Griffen Outhouse were fantastic the first night and then average the second.
Wednesday, October 3rd
In the first period, it became blatantly obvious that the Blazers would live or die with their special teams in this one. PDX went 2-for-4 and Kamloops 1-of-2 as the period ended 2-1 for Portland. All the scoring was done with the man advantage. “We had three power play goals, so our power play is working well.” head coach Serge Lajoie went on to talk about the quality of Portland’s offensive attack “When they have good close support on the puck and we aren’t able to establish any kind of containment and win those one on ones we’re just chasing it.”
20-year old forward Luc Smith went on to say:
“well, when we take penalties against one of the top power plays in the Western Hockey League, we can’t do that.”
The second period would prove to get a little out of hand as the Winterhawks would score four times in the first half of the period with one being on the power play, going up 6-1. Kamloops would respond with a power play goal of their own through Defenseman Luke Zazula but Mason Mannek would get that back to send Portland into the final frame holding a strong six-goal lead.
The Blazers cashed in again on the man-advantage in the third but it was too little, too late.
The final score: Portland 7 – Kamloops 3. If the Blazers want to be in a more competitive in the rematch on Friday they will need to improve their special teams – specifically the penalty kill. Kamloops ended the game 3-for-8 on the PP while Portland finished 3-of-6.
Luc Smith knows they will have to work harder on Friday “We got outworked, out played…It was a poor effort by everybody, we just didn’t have anything going. As soon as we do our cool down we’re going to be over it, we are going to be ready to go on Friday.”
The Blazers play this same Portland team on Friday before playing host to Victoria on Saturday.
