When the Prince George Cougars went looking for heroes to end an eight-year WHL playoff famine, three Prince George boys stepped forward with hockey sticks in hand to carry out that duty.
The Cougar's full contingent of local forward content -- Chase Witala, Jari Erricson and Brad Morrison -- each found the net to give the sea of white Cougars faithful exactly what they wanted, a 4-2 playoff win over the Victoria Royals Wednesday night at CN Centre.
The first playoff win of the postseason and first playoff win for the franchise since 2007 left the Cougars within a game of getting even in the best-of-seven Western Conference quarterfinal series. They trail Victoria two games to one and will have a chance to tie it up tonight with Game 4 at CN Centre (7 p.m. start). The win guarantees the series is going back to Victoria for Game 5 on Saturday.
After losing the first two games of the series in Victoria, the Cougars played with a lot more urgency than their opponents from start to finish and were rewarded in the end. Nursing a 3-2 lead to start the third period, the Cougars kept their feet firmly planted on the accelerator and kept up a bees' nest of activity in the Victoria end. It eventually paid off when David Soltes got the puck in the corner and threaded a needle to a streaking Morrison in front for an easy tap-in. Morrison's goal was his first of the playoffs and his team-leading fifth point in three games against Victoria.
Playing in front of a rowdy crowd of 4,202, Witala conjured up a little hometown magic while killing a penalty for the Cougars 13 minutes into the game. Witala took the puck from captain Sam Ruopp, skated down the left wing into the Royals' zone and with a burst of speed beat Jack Walker with an outside move, finishing with a high snap shot that found the corner of the net behind Coleman Vollrath. That came with 16 seconds left in a bench minor the Cougars got for too many men on the ice.
Their territorial dominance continued in the second period and another P.G. native, Erricson, took full advantage to earn his first goal of the playoffs on the power play, pouncing on a loose puck after Vollrath had trouble controlling Zach Pochiro's shot from the point.
Ruopp made it a 3-0 game with the teams at even strength, floating in a long wrist shot, 7:58 into the second and that was the gamewinner. At that point the Cougars had a 25-7 advantage in shots and looked to have the game well in hand. Not so.
The Royals have proven their ability to score goals in bunches and in a 44-second span of the second period they collected two to get themselves back into the game. The first came on Victoria's third power play of the game at 13:22. Walker put a weak shot on net into a crowd and Tyler Soy shoveled the loose puck into the open side of the net behind Ty Edmonds. Then at 14:06, Logan Fisher was ideally positioned at the post for the rebound after Edmonds stuck out his pad to deny Alex Forsberg.
The Cougars finished the second period leading the shot count 31-15.
Morrison's goal took some of the heat off the home team but the Royals certainly didn't quit. Walker brought out the best in Edmonds midway midway through the third, forcing the 18-year-old into a diving glove save which turned out his best stop of the game. A few minutes after that, Austin Carroll and Brandon Magee put Edmonds to the test in rapid-fire succession and Pochiro ended the flurry with a big shot block that no doubt left a mark. The shots ended up 42-24 for the Cougars.
LOOSE PUCKS: Heading into Wednesday's game, the last time the Cougars won a playoff game was on April 25, 2007 in Game 4 of the Western Conference final when Devin Setoguchi scored in overtime to give the Cats a 3-2 victory over the Vancouver Giants. The Giants won the next game 5-1 in Vancouver to clinch the series 4-1. Leading up to this year, the Cougars had missed the playoffs in five of the previous seven seasons. In each of their two playoff years since 2007, the Cats were swept in the first round, losing to Vancouver in 2009 and Kelowna in 2011... Defenceman Brandon Manning, who played four seasons for the Chilliwack Bruins from 2007-2011 before they moved to Victoria to become the Royals,assisted on Brayden Schenn's game-winning goal in a 4-1 victory Wednesday over the Pittsburgh Penguins. Called up this week from the AHL's Lehigh Valley Phantoms, it was Manning's second assist in six games this season with the Flyers. In that game, Penguins captain Sidney Crosby opened the scoring with his 300th career NHL goal.
