It was a close contest from start to finish, but the pucks bounced in favour of their opponents.
The Prince George Cougars made good plays in the third period and stuck with Vancouver, but at the final horn tonight (April 19), the scoreboard read 2-1 for the Giants.
This is the first regulation loss for the Cougars against the Giants in the 2020-21 B.C. Division hub season, with the scales slightly tipping to Prince George with a 2-1-0-1 record.
The Cats led the way with 34 shots on goal to 29 from the G-men, marking the fifth time this year they either outshot or tied their opponents in that category.
Goaltender Taylor Gauthier stopped 27 pucks and earned the game's third-star honour, while first star Trent Miner made 33 saves at the other end.
The game was all bagels nearly the opening 20 minutes of play, but Vancouver would strike first with 2:16 left.
Eric Florchuk knocked home a rebound after Zack Ostapchuk initiated a two-on-one outbreak into the Prince George zone.
The 1-0 score stayed the same for the rest of the period, then all of the second stanza despite the 10-8 shots in favour of Prince George and each team getting one power-play opportunity.
Cougars' rookie Riley Heidt provided some hype early in the third period to keep his team in the contest.
The 16-year-old carried the puck into Giants territory, moved it to the right of Prince George's own Jacob Gendron while he skated around his left, picked up at the goal line and tried to centre a pass.
The puck caught the inside skate of Mazden Leslie and into the Vancouver cage, giving Heidt his second goal of 2020-21 with assists to fellow rookie Hudson Thornton and Ethan Samson from earlier.
RILEY HEIDT EXPLAIN YOURSELF 🤯@PGCougars | #REMAXHub pic.twitter.com/tOr7eC3B4Z
— The WHL (@TheWHL) April 20, 2021
A 1-1 tie remained on the scoreboard for almost 10 full minutes, but an unfortunate error by Prince George in their own end led to the Giants restoring the one-goal advantage.
Samson tried to pass up the middle, but the puck was blocked by Justin Sourdif and bounced towards Tristen Nielsen at the face-off circle, who then passed it to Adam Hall and shot it past Gauthier.
It would prove to be the game-winning goal and Vancouver won its first game in regulation against Prince George by a score of 2-1.
Their divisional record drops to 4-5-1-1.
Prince George's next game is set for Thursday (April 22) in Kamloops against the hub-host Blazers.
The Cats will be the designated home team when the puck drops at 7 p.m.
