Sunday afternoon proved to be a big night in the Rose City as the Portland Winterhawks (35-16-3-3) clinched a playoff berth, Joachim Blichfeld scored a hat trick, and head coach Mike Johnston picked up his 350th win.
The Seattle Thunderbirds (23-28-5-1) were looking for three wins in as many nights, but Portland came out strong right off the drop of the puck.
Before the game was six minutes old, the Winterhawks already had 10 shots on goal.
“I thought our start to the game was really good.” Mike Johnston said. “That was a key to the game, was how we started. I thought we had a lot of jump, a lot of energy right away. Anytime a team is playing a three-in-three you want to put them on their heels a little bit. We wanted to have a lot of shots early, put them back and make them defend off the shot. That was our game plan and our guys executed well.”
MIchal Kvasnica opened the scoring with a burst of speed through the neutral zone. He went by two Seattle defenders before beating Thunderbirds goalie Cole Schwebius far side. Rookie Robbie Fromm-Delorme picked up the primary assist on the Slovakian import’s eighth goal of the season.
Jaxan Kaluski tipped a Keltie Jeri-Leon shot by Joel Hofer less than three minutes later to tie the game for Seattle.
Portland responded equally as fast as Josh Paterson picked up his 21st goal of the season.
The goal came via the power play, where Portland had struggled over the last 12 games.
Paterson described his goal, “It was a good pass across, and a good shot by Blichfeld. The rebound came right to me, and I just had to put it into the empty net.”
A key turning point came early in the second period when the Winterhawks thought they scored via a Cross Hanas goal. However, the goal was waived off and Johnston wasn’t pleased. “I don’t get it, they called it a goal on the ice and all of a sudden they decide in the huddle that it was goaltender interference. So I don’t know whether they saw it on the screen up top or if they decided on their own as they were to the penalty bench. It was weird that they called a goal on the ice and then they waive it off without a video replay.”
Shortly thereafter Reece Newkirk picked up an interference penalty giving Seattle a power play with an opportunity to tie the game.
Instead of evening the score, Seattle turned the puck over a the blue line, and Cody Glass spotted Blichfeld flying the zone. The overage forward made no mistake on the breakaway and gave Portland a 3-1 advantage.
Johnston felt “that was really key because I thought after the call-back goal our team was emotional about it. Then we take a penalty so now they are on the power play. We score and get our crowd and bench back in it. That game could have swung either way at that point of time if they scored on their power play versus us scoring shorthanded.”
Before the night was over Blichfeld picked up another power play goal on seeing-eye pass from Glass after Jake Gricius won a puck battle along the wall.
The hat trick was completed for Blichfeld just over nine minutes into the third period as Cody Glass again found Blichfled for the tally. Glass contributed the primary assist on all three Blichfeld goals.
Blichfeld spoke after the game about playing with Cody Glass again, “He is a great player and is always fun to play with him and Paty (Josh Paterson). As a line we had success tonight and have to keep it going. We’ve had success ever since Paty came and it is just fun playing hockey right now.”
Matthew Wedman scored Seattle’s second goal in the final thirty seconds of the second period giving him 32 on the year, and goals in six straight games.
Portland finished with 52 shots and with the win clinched a playoff berth for tenth year in a row. However, Johnston feels his team has higher aspirations, “All it means is we are in the playoffs. It isn’t something that we were targeting, but obviously wanted to get in the playoffs, but we are trying to get as high as we can and is our goal we are working towards.”
In the victory Johnston also picked up his 350th win in the WHL and was caught off guard post game, “I didn’t know that” he said. “I had no idea where I was for number of wins, but anytime you get 300 wins, or 350, in this league it shows you have been in this league for a little while. However, it is good, and it is nice.”
Portland travels to Vancouver this afternoon to complete their three-in-three and Paterson expects a tough game, “They play a good, skilled game, so we will need to be at our best and it will be a good challenge for us.”
Notes:
– Defensemen Matthew Quigley and Brendan De Jong each missed the game due to injury, so all three Portland rookie defenseman played again.
– The four point evening for Joachim Blichfeld was his eighth of the season, and his 11th all time.
– Joel Hofer started back-to-back games and picked up his seventh win with Portland. In his 11 games with the Winterhawks his save percentage is 0.920 with a 2.76 goals against average.
– Both Portland goalies are playing well right now as Shane Farkas is expected to start against Vancouver on Monday. The last matchup between the two teams saw Farkas record his fourth shutout of the season.
