Ty Edmonds did his best impression of an octopus, but after making three saves in a mad scramble around the Prince George Cougar' net, there was nothing he could do to prevent Liam Stewart from becoming the hero for Spokane Chiefs.
Stewart's tip-in found the net behind Edmonds with six minutes left in the third period to lift the Chiefs to a 3-2 win over the Cougars, ending the Cats' four-game winning streak in front of a crowd of 8,038 Saturday at Spokane Arena.
Defenceman Marc McNulty scored both Cougar goals, and now has four goals in the past five games for a total of six this season. McNulty got his stick on Joseph Carvalho's point shot at the end of the first period to make a 2-1 game and tied it with a slapper from the slot 7:18 into the second period.
Hudson Elyniuk opened the scoring with the Teddy Bear Toss goal 9:16 into the first and Adam Helewka added to the total later in the period with his 16th of the season, finishing off a 2-on-1 break.
The Cougars ended up with a split on their two-game road trip, winning 3-1 Friday over the WHL U.S. Division-leading Everett Silvertips. They came out strong against the Chiefs but were stymied by goalie Garret Hughson, who made 23 saves as the game's first star. Edmonds also was solid in net in his sixth straight start.
Both teams travelled through the night leading up to Saturday's game and Cougars assistant coach Mike Hengen said that lack of sleep didn't take anything away from the effort of his players. The Cougars had numerous quality chances throughout the game and came close to tying it in the final minute with Edmonds on the bench.
"I thought we were making some big-time plays in tight situations and that gave us a real shot to win that game," said Hengen. "We only gave up four goals against on the weekend and one of those was on a 5-on-3, so things are definitely trending in the right direction. The kids are giving their all.
"You don't beat Kelowna in their rink and Everett in their rink [very often] and I don't remember the last time we had an effort like this after getting in at 4 a.m."
The Cougars (16-17-0-0) remained third in the B.C. Division, just two points behind the Victoria Royals (17-16-2-0) who lost 4-0 Saturday in Vancouver. The Cougars have two games in hand over Victoria. The Chiefs (16-12-3-0) moved into third in the U.S. Division.
Spokane won 4-3 Friday in Portland to end a five-game losing streak. On Saturday the Chiefs outshot the Cougars 16-7 in the third period. In total, shots were 31-25 in Spokane's favour.
"Our team came out of that game last night really invested," Chiefs coach Don Nachbaur told the Spokane Spokesman review. "We worked really worked hard (Friday). ... I liked our effort in both games. We were really tired and it took some mental toughness."
"I thought we traded chances too many times in the first two periods. That's why they got back in the game. In the third, we had the puck in the areas that we wanted it. Our structure was there and our structure got us the game-winning goal."
The Cougars lost defenceman Josh Anderson to an undisclosed injury in the Everett game. They were also without winger David Soltes (attending Slovakia's world junior camp) and defenceman Sam Ruopp (who served the second of a two-game suspension for a kneeing major penalty in the Saskatoon game Tuesday).
Spokane will be at CN Centre Tuesday and Wednesday, the last games for the Cougars before a nine-day Christmas break.
