Rockets face off against Tri-City at Prospera
The Kelowna Rockets dominated from start to finish.
Once they finally solved Tri-City Americans goaltender Evan Sarthou, it was game over.
Dillon Dube got Kelowna on the board with six seconds left in the second period and Reid Gardiner and Nolan Foote scored a minute apart in the third as the Rockets forged ahead for a 4-2 win in WHL action at Prospera Place on Saturday night.
Dube added an empty-net goal in the final minute and Kelowna won its 40th game for the fifth straight season one night after clinching a playoff spot for a 10th consecu- tive campaign with Friday’s 3-2 shootout win in Everett.
Saturday’s comeback seemed inevitable, with the Rockets pushing the pace and generating plenty of quality scoring chances despite falling behind 2-0 in the first period. They just couldn’t beat Sarthou — until Dube cut out of the corner and roofed Kelowna’s 37th shot of the game over his shoulder.
“Any time you get a goal real late in the period when you’re behind, it gives you energy and momentum,” said Rockets head coach Jason Smith. “We came out and started the next period with pace and with energy and kind of built from that, and the game ended the right way for us.”
Kelowna was deserving of the two points, the better team from the opening puck-drop in outshooting the visitors 7-1 and 14-2 at times in the opening frame. That advantage was 21-9 and 37-17 at the period breaks, 43-24 in the end.
“He was really good, he was making some big saves, but we just stuck to it and kept shooting,” Foote said of Sarthou’s early heroics, though he had no chance on Foote’s wicked one-timer that stood up as his second game-winner in as many nights after also scoring the deciding goal in the sixth round of Friday’s shootout.
“Everybody was a little frustrated, but that’s big for us, to stay with it,” added Dube. “That was close to one of the best 60 minutes we’ve played, getting down like that and being able to come back.”
The importance of that perseverance wasn’t lost on Smith, who made a goaltending change to start the second period — with Michael Herringer stopping all 15 shots he faced in relief of backup Brodan Salmond.
“It would have been nice to capitalize a little earlier in the game, but the guys stuck with it, we didn’t start to cheat, and we continued to create opportunities,” said Smith. “We did lots of good things.”
It was good news all around, as the second-place Rockets (40-21-5-0) moved three points ahead of the rival Kamloops Blazers (38-23-2-4), who got swept 8-4 and 6-1 by the top-ranked Prince George Cougars (42-20-3-2) in their weekend doubleheader.
Bolstered by the return of top defenceman Brendan Guhle, the Cougars remained four points up on the Rockets for the B.C. Division lead, though Kelowna has a game in hand and arguably an easier schedule, with Saturday the start of a six-game homestand before closing out the campaign against the last-place Vancouver Giants in Langley on March 18.
The Rockets have three games left against Vancouver — here on Friday, then that season-ending home-and-home — but they also have to face the streaking Victoria Royals (37-23-4-1, 6-0-0-1 in their last seven) twice this coming week, on Tuesday and Saturday.
All three games this week are 7:05 p.m. starts at Prospera Place.
“We’re not really worried about it too much,” Smith said of scoreboard watching in P.G. this weekend and the rest of the way.
“We’ll worry about what we can control, as our group, and where the cards lay at the end of the year is where they are.
“We believe if we play well for the remainder of the season, we’ll be in a good spot where we’re happy with and we’ll go from there.”
The Americans (38-25-3-0) also clinched a playoff spot in defeat Saturday since the Spokane Chiefs also lost, 4-3 in overtime at Victoria.
ICE CHIPS: Kelowna scratched C Tomas Soustal (undisclosed), RW Leif Mattson and D Konrad Belcourt . . . . Tri-City was without top C Michael Rasmussen (lowerbody, 1-2 weeks), who is projected to be a first-round pick in this year’s NHL draft . . . . Rockets defence prospect Kaedan Korczak, the team’s first-round pick from last year’s bantam draft, scored a hat-trick on Thursday night — including the double-overtime winner — to stage an upset in the Saskatchewan midget 3A league playoffs. Korczak and the seventhseeded Yorkton RawTec Maulers eliminated the second-seeded Notre Dame Hounds with a 4-3 victory in Game 4 of their best-of-five series. The Rockets traded up to select Korczak at 11th overall, and the recently turned 16-year-old finished second in team scoring for Yorkton this season, with 11 goals and 29 points in 42 games.