A shootout was needed to solve a back and forth battle Tuesday night between the Victoria Royals and Kelowna Rockets.
The game saw the momentum swing between each period. In the end, it was decided by a shootout winner from Kaid Oliver, who beat Rockets goalie Roman Basran to seal the Royals’ 4-3 victory.
“I watched Gary [Haden] go and Basaran made a good move, he was moving quickly,” described Oliver on his shootout goal. “So, I was going to read it off of how he [Basran] was moving back. He played well tonight, it’s tough to put the puck in on him. It luckily went in.”
Victoria looked to have all the momentum in the early game, taking an early lead and greatly outshooting Kelowna. The second saw a counterpunch by the Rockets, who looked to take control of the game. In the third, Victoria bounced back early, tied the game up and sent it to overtime.
“It was two good teams going at it,” said Victoria Head Coach Dan Price. “We started strong, being at home, the guys were fresh and ready to go. We were able to get some puck possession early, but we knew Kelowna would respond. They did, were very opportunistic early on their chances.”
“Kelowna’s a good team,” said the game’s first star Will Warm. “We had a pretty good start to the game, then in the second period, we took a step back. But we had a belief in ourselves going to the third that we were going to find a way.”
“We had to regroup,” said Price of his team’s rally. “When there were lapses, we tried to rebuild from that. Ultimately, a few guys made plays to put us over the edge.”
The first period started with some sustained pressure from Victoria, which resulted in an early powerplay for the home team. The ensuing powerplay led to some chances but Basran stood his ground. Midway through the first period, Victoria looked in control with shots 10-to-1 in their favour.
Victoria drew first blood as a mix up with the linesman and the Kelowna defender led to the puck squirting free to some open ice. Gary Haden picked it up and went in all alone and beat Basran at 12:27 to make it 1-0.
The Rockets salvaged what would be a disastrous period and tied it up late in the first. Pavel Novak made a nice redirect on a Cayde Augustine shot to put the puck past Royals starting goalie Brock Gould.
Kelowna opened the second period with some jump, and it paid off early to give them the 2-1 lead. A point shot by Sean Comrie beat Gould who was screened in front, the second goal of the season for Comrie.
The Rockets added to their lead as Ethan Ernst buried the puck on the short side of Gould at 7:30. Three Kelowna goals on eight shots led to a goalie switch for the Royals, as Shane Farkas entered the game.
In a reversal from the first period, the second saw the action controlled by the Rockets. The visitors scored a pair of goals and outshot the Royals 11 to 6 in the second frame. At the end of the period, tempers flared and penalties were handed out. Oliver was in the middle of the fracas, and it seemed to spark his team.
“We have a lot more grit than people give us credit for,” said Oliver. ‘There’s a lot of guys in this locker room that are tough guys and will work hard. Sometimes you just need we just need to inject a little bit of that grit back in.”
To start the third, it was again an early goal. This time it was Will Warm for Victoria, who gathered the puck at the sidewall and turned fired.
“I got the puck on the wall at the blueline and took a couple of steps to the middle just trying to hit the net and it managed to go in,” said Warm.
The goal at 1:56 of the third brought it back to being a one-goal game.
Victoria kept the scoring going just over a minute later, as Oliver tied the game with his first of the season. Tarun Fizer made a nice short pass to Oliver, who wired it past Basran at 3:10. That was it for the scoring as each team could not close it out and the game went to overtime.
The extra frame could not solve anything as well and the game went to a shootout.
In the shootout, Farkas looked calm and stopped all three Kelowna attempts. Oliver made good on his attempt, and the Royals secured the shootout win.
After coming in for relief for Gould, Farkas turned aside all shots he faced. “Shane came in made some saves to close the door,” said Price. “The guys rallied, and it did change the tone and tempo. But tonight was no fault of Brock [Gould], we just had some breakdowns in front of him.”
Up Next
These two teams meet again on Wednesday night, the second game of nine meetings this season. It is a game Oliver is looking forward to between these two teams. “It’s always like a playoff game,” said Oliver. “I love the battle, it’s always fun. There are 20 guys that are ready to come out fighting tomorrow.”
