Brian Liesse

Seattle’s second period surge takes down Portland 5-3

(Kent, WA) The Interstate 5 rivalry is alive and well.

The Seattle Thunderbirds and Portland Winterhawks took to the ShoWare Center ice on Saturday night and played the first of 12 games between the two squads this season. With the WHL season being cut down to 68 games, those 12 games are a healthy portion of the schedule.

If opening night is any sign of things to come, fans will be treated to a lot of fun nights whether they be at the ShoWare Center, Moda Center or Veterans Memorial Coliseum.

In Kent on Saturday, the Thunderbirds used a second period surge to fly out to a 4-1 lead, en route to a 5-3 home win. Zack Andrusiak and Dillon Hamaliuk led the way with three points apiece and Liam Hughes was stellar with 30 saves on 33 shots.

Andrusiak (Brian Liesse)

For the Portland Winterhawks, it was a learning experience in front of a raucous road crowd of 6,069.

Portland Head Coach, General Manager and Vice President Mike Johnston iced three 16-year-old forwards and an altogether pretty young squad.

“We’ve got a lot of young players right now and we have not played a game in two weeks. We didn’t play last weekend and usually that is by our choice. I did not mind our first period coming out. Second period – our puck management was not very good,” Johnston said.

Seth Jarvis, the former first round Bantam Draft pick had a night to remember in the loss. The 16-year-old forward netted his first ever WHL goal in the third period and then added another to lead the comeback from three goals down.

Johnston was impressed by the way his rookie center played.

“I thought if you really looked at his game, he really took charge of the game. There was 6,000 plus people here, it was their home opener  – his first WHL game really – as a 15-year-old he did play some – I think he just seized the moment and took charge. He had a couple breakaways and a penalty shot” Defensively he played his area well. He did well in the low zone. He played well.”

Seattle and Portland traded 23 shots in the first period as both teams tried to capitalize on turnovers and multiple odd-man rushes.

Seattle got things going with their first goal of the season. It came off the stick of captain Nolan Volcan on the power play.

Then after Tyrel Bauer and Payton McIsaac were called for penalties, Portland was set up with 1:00 of a 5-on-3 man advantage. They would not need that long.

Reece Newkirk dropped a pass to Danish import Joachim Blichfeld and the overage winger drilled a one-timer by Hughes to tie the game.

The Thunderbirds came out flying in the second and scored three goals in the first 6:03 to go up 4-1.

Hamaliuk set up the first goal for Seattle 50 seconds into the frame. He dangled around two Winterhawks and then fed Andrusiak at the back post for the 2-1 lead.

Then Seattle burst up the ice on the rush and Andrusiak found Owen Williams for the snipe. The goal was his first with Seattle with his last WHL goal coming in the 2016-17 season with the Regina Pats.

The surge was finished off when Hamaliuk pounced on a turnover off the stick of Portland defenseman Clay Hanus and found Matthew Wedman. Portland goalie Shane Farkas could not get over in time and stop the Wedman shot from in close.

(photo – Brian Liesse)

Farkas had 30 saves on 34 shots.

Johnston thought his team really put their goalie in some tough spots.

“I did not think he had a chance with the first two goals. One was a back door play and the other one was a three-on-two where we did not cover the high guy. I thought we gave him some tough shots in the second period, but in the first and third he was solid. He was at Calgary camp and only played part of one preseason game. I thought he was good tonight.”

Jarvis tried to stem the tide with a couple rushes up the ice in behind the defense. On the first, he was stopped by Hughes but drew a penalty, on the second he drew a penalty shot.

He fanned on the shot, which drew jeers from the ShoWare crowd.

Things got feisty late in the frame as Blichfield was given a 10-minute misconduct and then Brendan De Jong caught Noah Philp with a check, leading to a melee where three tussles took place.

Portland recovered in the third and the line of Jarvis, Michael Kvasnica and Cross Hanas created some good looks.

That hard work would lead to an odd-man rush where Hanas made a slick pass over to Jarvis for the one-timer. The goal was Jarvis’ first ever WHL goal.

“(Nick) Cicek and  Michael (Kvasnica) made some great plays to keep the puck in and Cross (Hanas) got it. He made an amazing backhand pass and all I had to do was raise the puck into the net. That was as easy as they come. I could not ask for better linemates or teammates to make that happen,” Jarvis said.

The 16-year-old kept his hot stick going as he burst up the ice and sniped a shot over Hughes’ glove to make it a one-goal game at 4-3.

“Cicek again made another great pass to me and Michael drove the net perfectly to draw the defenseman and I just took my shot.”

Things got even tenser late as Portland pressed with an extra attacker. The end result though was an empty net goal from Hamaliuk to ice the game.

Portland went 1-for-4 on the power play, while Seattle was 1-of-5.

Portland now heads to Everett for a game tomorrow, while Seattle is off until next Friday when they will take on

Notes:

-When asked about his 2002-class. Johnston was excited. “We really like our 2002 group. We have Kurtis Smythe signed – he will play at Delta Academy as a defenseman. (Dante) Giannuzzi as a goaltender. We have three forwards in our lineup now. We have (Tyson) Kozak, who we sent back to Manitoba – a really good late 2002 player. We have a couple guys I am trying to sign too. I think our 2002 group is something we can build around.”

Mike Johnston (photo-Dayna Fjord)

-Blichfeld unexpectedly coming back has put Johnston and Portland into a tight spot. They can either trade the overage import forward our release one of 2000-born Kvasnica and 2001-born Dean Schwenninger.

“With players staying at the NHL level or coming back, we are used to that. We had a lot of guys at NHL camps this year and it looks like Skyler McKenzie will be staying in Manitoba with the Moose and then Blichfeld returned. The feeling in San Jose was that they have a lot of signed forwards signed and if they could move a player back to junior – which they are going to do with a couple of their guys – they can continue to stay and develop at that level. Blichfeld has taken some nice steps – I thought he was good tonight. He has not really played a game in awhile – he did not play with us in the preseason.

“With him coming back, now we have a tough decision to make with our Euros and our overage players.”

-Johnston looks at this weekend as a chance to look at some of the newer guys and see who sticks around.

“I always think in your first couple of weekends, you have to play your lineup and see where guys fit. It’s a little bit different if you have a veteran lineup, but that is not the case with us. We had six or seven new players in our lineup tonight. That is a lot of different bodies. So we have to play guys and then react with our overage and Euro situations. Once things settle down, we will see where things are.”