Chiefs continue to confound Blades

By Les Lazaruk

 

SPOKANE, Wa. – Occasionally, not scoring on a two-man advantage doesn’t hurt a team. But, that wasn’t the case for the Saskatoon Blades Wednesday.

After failing to score on a two-man power play in Tuesday’s 5-2 victory at Tri-Cities, the Bridge City Bunch were presented with 1:17 worth of 5-on-3 power play chance, with the score tied 2-2 in the second period, when rookie Slovak forward Milos Fafrak went off for charging, followed by a “puck over glass” delay of game to Chiefs’ defenceman Dalton Hamaliuk.

However, none of the Blades’ four shots on goal…either on the 5-on-3 or succeeding 5-on-4…hit the back of the net behind Spokane rookie goaltender Donovan Buskey. Six seconds after Hamaliuk’s penalty ended, his intended pass on a 3-on-1 rush was broken up…only to land on the stick of Jaret Anderson-Dolan, with a wide open net. The goal put the Chiefs up 3-2 and they never looked back on the way to a 6-2 triumph.

“Yeah you could call (that) the turning point,” admitted Saskatoon assistant coach Bryce Thoma. “It’s unfortunate on the 5-on-3 that we couldn’t get a goal. We had a couple of good looks but…”

The turn of events against the Bridge City Bunch means eight straight, head-to-head, losses to Spokane. The last Blades win over the Chiefs came January 5, 2010 at the Spokane Veterans Memorial Arena…a 5-4 decision. That leaves Saskatoon 1-1-0 on their five-game U.S. Division road trip…10-13-3 overall on the season.

The Blue and Gold opened the scoring when Kirby Dach snapped a 14-game goal-less streak when his sharp-angle shot hit a post, ricocheted in front, bounced off a Chiefs defender and in.

Ethan McIndoe scored back-to-back goals to give Spokane a 2-1 lead after the first period. Dach tied the score early in the second, but that was the last time the Blades really threatened.

Hudson Elynuik and Zach Fischer notched power play goals while defenceman-turned-forward Jeff Faith completed the scoring as the Chiefs out-shot Saskatoon 17-2 after the missed 5-on-3 opportunity…37-24 overall.

The Bridge City Bunch are idle until Saturday when they hit the mid-point of the “American Adventure”, visiting the Everett Silvertips.

Pacman Points – The victory was the fourth straight at home for Spokane, now 14-9-3 for the season. The Chiefs have also beaten all four East Divison visitors so far with just Brandon and Swift Current remaining to come through.

The loss ended the Blades four-game run of gaining at least one point in the standings. They trail Prince Albert by two points for fifth place in the East Division and the eighth and final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference. The Raiders grabbed a single point with a 4-3 overtime loss in Kootenay Wednesday.

Dach’s two goals upped his consecutive-game points streak to six games, during which he has the two goals plus six assists. However the runs of 20-year-old forwards Braylon Shmyr (seven games) and Cam Hebig (four games) came to an end as both were held off the scoresheet.

Saskatoon lost the services of right winger Caleb Fantillo late in the third period. He clutched at  his left knee and had to be helped off the ice and to the dressing room following an awkward bump with a Spokane player near the Chiefs’ net. The status of the 19-year-old wasn’t immediately known after the game.

The Bridge City Bunch were 0-for-4 on the power play while Spokane was 2-for-5 on the man advantage. In their last seven games, the Blue and Gold have killed off just 23 of 35 opposition power plays for an efficiency rate of 65.7%.

With 19-year-old starter Ryan Kubic still sidelined by a Lower Body injury and 18-year-old Joel Grzybowski returned to the Battlefords of the SJHL, the Blades recalled 15-year-old Koen MacInnes from Burnaby of the C-S-S-H-L. He joins 16-year-old Nolan Maier as the Blue and Gold’s goalies. In addition, centre Logan Christensen is with the team, but has missed the last 21 games due to an internal upper body injury. He is expected to play during the trip. Left winger Arjun Atwal was re-assigned to Sherwood Park of the Alberta Junior League. Defenceman Randen Schmidt and forward Brandon Machado were healthy scratches.

Spokane’s scratches were all coaches decisions…defenceman Matt Leduc, right winger Cedric Chenier and left winger Luke Toporowski.

The Chiefs won 31 of 59 faceoffs with Elynuik leading the way by capturing possession for his team on six of nine draws. Chase Wouters was tops for the Blades, winning 10 of 15 trips to the dot.

The busiest individual shooters overall were Elynuik, McIndoe, Anderson-Dolan and Kailer Yamamoto…all with four shots on goal for Spokane. Dach and Hebig paced Saskatoon with four shots as well.