The seventh meeting this season between the Portland Winterhawks (29-13-3-2) and Seattle Thunderbirds (17-22-5-1) lived up to the hype of the thriving I-5 rivalry.
Portland controlled play for the first 40 minutes outshooting Seattle 35-11 and led 2-0 when the second period came to a close.
The Thunderbirds pushed back in the third period both territoriality as well as on the shot clock.
Trailing by two, Seattle controlled the play most of the period, sending 12 shots onto Joel Hofer to Portland’s five on Cole Schwebius.
In the final minute of the game the Thunderbirds scored twice including a goal by Matthew Wedman with two seconds remaining to force overtime.
Seattle Thunderbirds Head Coach Matt O’Dette said, “We needed that fire and jump in the first 40. Credit to the guys, there is that no quit mentality, never say die, never out of the fight, and got a huge point out of it.”
Winterhawks head coach Mike Johnston thought “our first two periods were really good. In the third, you have to look back on it as a coach because if the game finished 2-0 maybe it was a game where you thought, ‘jeez, we played a pretty textbook game from start to finish.’ They tie it up late.”
Portland played a different game in the third period which Johnston described, “I’ve never really seen our team sit back in the third period. I didn’t think we were particularly sharp in the third, but still had a 2-0 lead with a minute left in the game.”
Seattle’s Jarret Tyszka set up both goals for the Thunderbirds as Simon Kubicek’s shot from the point got through traffic cutting the WInterhawks lead to one.
In the final seconds he spotted Matthew Wedman who one timed a shot to even the score at two.
O’Dette said of Tyszka, “He made a great play there finding Wedman for the one timer, some nice vision there. Right before that, I liked the poise bringing it back up the ice. With 20 seconds left he just got it over their blue line and made a nice play. Really smart plays by him tonight.”
“We have to be better in those types of situations.” Johnston said about the final minute of play. “We have to learn from it, block shots in critical situations, need when we are on the ice to be selling out so the puck doesn’t get to the net.”
With the Thunderbirds shutting down Portland’s top line, a different group needed to step up and Johnston felt the line of Michal Kvasnica, Lane Gilliss, and Robbie Fromm-Delorme answered, “If you actually look at their record over the last little while they have played some good hockey. Five-on-five they are a line we count on to be a good, solid line. They continue to get chances and each had a couple of points tonight. I thought they have been playing well which is why I kept them together.”
The line provided both regulation goals for Portland. Lane Gilliss opened the scoring for Portland after a faceoff. “We had a set faceoff play off the neutral zone draw” Gilliss said. “Quigs [Matthew Quigley] made a nice pass to Robbie [Fromm-Delorme], he got inside for me, and I just put it in. I was more just trying to look far side even if it just went off the pad. I saw Michal [Kvasnica] driving to the net, but it just worked out.”
Robbie Fromm-Delorme extended the Portland advantage to 2-0 after passes from Gilliss and Nick Perna sprung the 16-year-old rookie on a two-on-one with Michal Kvasnica. The Richmond, BC native detailed his goal, “The puck got pushed up and rolled through onto my stick. I looked at my options, saw Michal, and decided to shoot it. I saw that he [Schwebius] was over committing a little bit and that the far side would be open. So I took my chances and shot low glove, and it went in.”
With the 2-0 lead, and on a power play, a scary moment occurred for Portland when captain Cody Glass went down with a lower-body injury. The center was driving to the net when he got tangled up with Tyler Carpendale in an innocent looking play. Play was stopped to attend to Glass who was helped off the ice and didn’t return.
MIke Johnston did not provide any indication on his status after the game.
Earlier in the game Seattle’s captain Nolan Volcan also left the game early, but with an upper-body injury. O’Dette also didn’t have an update but said, “Obviously Volcan is a big part of our team, fingers crossed on that. Other guys stepped up and however it shakes out, we need a great effort from everybody.”
With the comeback and losing their captain, Portland had the opportunity to lose the extra point in overtime, but remained positive on the bench. Gilliss said, “I think it is one of those things where you can’t get too down ourselves. We have a big overtime coming up, so it would just shoot us in the foot if we did. I think we did a good job just staying positive having our minds right.”
In overtime Seth Jarvis stepped up, which came to no surprise to Johnston, “He has had a good second half and is playing on the top of his game right now. Night in and night out he has been one of our more consistent players.”
Jarvis was taken down in overtime and granted a penalty shot by the referees which provided some potential controversy.
O’Dette said, “That’s not a clear cut breakaway, that’s for sure. I don’t know, a bizarre call. They [the referees] didn’t say anything to me. It happened so fast and it’s over.”
From Johnston’s perspective, “Jarvis took the puck to the net and got hooked as he was going to the net. Depending on how much room, I couldn’t see, but the refs were going to call either a penalty shot or not. It is really hard to determine there.”
As Jarvis prepared to take his penalty shot he was hoping “for not a repeat of the first game of the year where I missed.”
In the first game of the season the rookie had a penalty shot against the Thunderbirds, but failed to convert. “In Seattle it was a lot different. I think there was about 6,000 people booing me the entire time, so nerves obviously played a factor.”
Saturday night was a different story playing in front 6,691 Portland fans. “Here, everyone was cheering me, so I felt I could do it” Jarvis said. “I had an idea coming in with speed because the two goals we scored earlier we got with speed. When I started cutting to the middle, he didn’t pull across as much so I had an opening.”
Jarvis said that what transpired after he saw the puck go in was “unbelievable, great to get one in front of these fans.”
After the two points were secured, Gilliss said, “Those were huge coming down the stretch. Every game is a battle and every game is a fight. Just positioning wise, big for us.”
With Glass’ status unknown, Portland prepares to play the Lethbridge Hurricanes on Sunday in the only matchup of the season. Lethbridge is completing a three-in-three after winning in Seattle on Friday and losing to Everett on Saturday.
Notes:
– Portland’s power play is in a dry spell going 4-of-32 in their last six games. Johnston commented after the game about the power play, “I didn’t think our power play guys were very sharp tonight. Generally, most nights I’m really happy with our power play. Some nights we don’t convert but have some good looks and opportunities. Tonight, I didn’t think we were in sync or made good choices on the power play. That was the one part of our game that I didn’t like tonight.”
– While the power play has dropped off, the penalty kill for the WInterhawks remains strong successfully killing 22 of the 24 power plays.
– Cross Hanas was a healthy scratch per Mike Johnson and Haydn Delorme joined the line with Jake Gricius and Mason Mannek.
