Neither the Kamloops Blazers nor the glass that lines the rink at the Sandman Centre was ready for the pressure of Game 6.
The Victoria Royals brought the Blazers three-week thrill ride to a screeching halt with a 4-1 decision Monday night, when they eliminated their divisional rival from the WHL Playoffs.
To the surprise of some, Blazers bench boss Serge Lajoie tapped on the shoulder of 16-year-old netminder Dylan Garand for the do-or-die scenario.
“I don’t look at 16 or 20, I look at who might give us the best chance to win. I thought that Garand was a little tired from that previous stretch but I thought he was rested coming in. It was not an easy decision,” said Lajoie.
The Victoria native was largely responsible for dragging the Blazers as far as they did, going 6-0-0-1 to close out the regular season, but the bandwagon ran out of steam, as the Royals became the first Victoria-based team (including Victoria Cougars) to down the Blazers. Victoria teams were previously 0-5.
As usual, the Blazers came out with some jam in the first, playing charged up in front of another sellout crowd of 5,876.
The momentum was thwarted in the most unusual way less than five minutes into the first.
Connor Zary was battling Royals centre Logan Doust along the boards, when Doust’s stick smacked the glass, shattering it and sending broken shards two rows deep. The delay lasted 21 minutes.
“We were generating a lot of o-zone time, but it was the turnovers that hurt us in Game 5 and tonight in Game 6. They proved to be costly. I don’t think it was because of the glass,” said Lajoie.
It was a rough night for Blazer blue liners, as Joonas Sillanpaa coughed up the puck in his own zone as Brandon Cutler sniped his second of the series at the 12:05 mark of the opening frame.
Later in the second, Sean Strange drew a penalty for clearing the puck over the unbroken glass. Cutler picked up his second of the game when he tipped in a Jake Kustra point shot.
“The thing about Brandon is that he is very competitive and a very good defensive player. We like his compete on the ice and he’s a very cerebral guy,” said Royals Head Coach Dan Price. “He thinks the game a lot, works hard and it’s great to see him apply the work from this year into a big game for us.”
Because it’s April Fool’s Day, the Hockey Gods played another prank on the Blazers and stymied any momentum in the second period when the much larger winger Jermaine Loewen crunched Sean Gulka in the Royals’ zone. Once again, the glass showered patrons in the first few rows. This time, the delay only lasted 18 minutes.
But when the teams returned to the clean surface, the Royals still carried the edge despite only dressing 19 players.
Zane Franklin took a crosschecking penalty behind the Royals’ net with the puck in the neutral zone. It didn’t take long for the Royals to convert their third goal, as Ralph Jarratt snapped one past a screened Garand. It was the Royals seventh shot on net.
Luke Zazula gave Tarun Fizer a penalty shot after coughing up the puck on the blue line, but Garand bailed him out. Garand couldn’t repeat a similar result moments later when Dino Kameitz stripped Zazula, dished it over to Carson Miller who tucked it five-hole.
“Maybe you saw a team tonight that was mentally tired. We made some mistakes that we haven’t seen earlier. We needed to be sharp tonight and we weren’t,” said Lajoie. “This was basically our eighth sudden death Game 7 in the last 24 days.”
Ferguson was between the pipes to start the third in what was eventually his final game as a Blazer. The Blazers former eighth-round pick in the 2013 Bantam Draft stopped all 10 shots he faced.
“I can’t say enough about Dylan [Ferguson] for being a consummate pro and teammate. When we made the decision to go with Garand, he was on board and very supportive the whole way,” said Lajoie.
The 20-year-old on the other end of the ice had a fairly easy night in the crease. Aside from a nice right pad save early on Franklin and a pair of stops on the red-hot Zary in the slot in the third, everything was routine for Griffen Outhouse. He turned away 34-of-35 shots.
“We didn’t want to go back for Game 7,” said Cutler. “We had a bunch of guys step up tonight and Griffen was outstanding. Everyone is confident when he’s back there. We know he’s going to stand on his head and he did tonight.”
The Blazers broke the goose egg in the third when Kobe Mohr spotted Orrin Centazzo in the slot, as he ripped home his first of the playoffs.
Even though the game bled past 10 p.m. and it was evident the home side wasn’t going to pull it out, a majority of the crowd stuck around to salute their team and thank them for the trip that was the past three weeks.
Meanwhile, the Royals will tangle with the Vancouver Giants in the Western Conference semifinal in a rematch of last year’s first round. The Royals slighted the Giants in 7 games last year. Puck drop for Game 1 is set for Friday at the Langley Events Centre.
