When the Spokane Chiefs rolled into town on Sunday they had two things to motivate their actions on the ice Monday afternoon against the Prince George Cougars.
The Chiefs are in desperation mode, needing to win as many games as they can to get past Portland in the race for a WHL Western Conference wild-card playoff spot.
They also wanted to win for head coach Don Nachbaur, knowing the two games against the Cougars this week are his only hometown visits this season.
After a tough start, the Chiefs got the job done. The were outshot 24-7 and fell behind 3-1 in the first period, then scored three unanswered power-play goals to defeat the Cougars 4-3.
Since he took over the Chiefs from the AHL in 2010, Nachbaur has continued to win often in Prince George. He’s 8-3 in seven years of regular season games at CN Centre with Spokane, and had a 9-3 record in P.G. in six seasons with the Tri-City Americans.
“I love coming home and the guys know that, they play hard for me, they know I’m from Prince George and I think put a little more into it,” said Nachbaur, who improved his career WHL coaching record to 689-512-100, third in wins on the all-time list.
Chiefs right winger Kailer Yamamoto and centre Jaret Anderson-Dolan, both projected as can’t-miss prospects for the NHL draft in June, showed the crowd of 4,442 why they’re attracting so much attention. Playing on a line with his Keanu Yamamoto (Kailer’s 20-year-old brother), the high-scoring trio had a hand in all four Spokane goals.
The Chiefs (24-23-6-3) played Friday night in Portland and hosted Tri-City on Saturday and they looked a bit overwhelmed at first. Tate Olson opened the scoring for the Cats with a point shot 6:30 into the game and Kailer Yamamoto countered for the Chiefs five minutes later with an unassisted goal, beating Ty Edmonds with a hard shot from the face-off circle.
A great individual effort from Jansen Harkins, who dragged the puck across the crease, set up Radovan Bondra for his 27th goal. Two minutes later, Bondra sprung Harkins with a lead pass and he used his speed to get free of his check and score through the legs of Chiefs' goalie Dawson Weatherill.
But all their hard work unraveled on the Cougars in the second period. They ran into penalty problems, starting with a bench minor for too many men while the Cats were at the tail end of power play, 1:13 into the period. Colby McAuley put the puck into the net but the officials had done the count and there were six Cougar skaters joining the celebration parade.
It took the Cats more than 11 minutes to get their first shot on goal in the period and by that time Hudson Elynuik had scored on a power-play setup in front from Kailer Yamamoto.
“We got away from the system, guys wanted to bark at each other and blame each other for their mistakes and when that thing starts rolling we’re in big trouble,” said Cougars head coach Richard Matvichuk.
The Chiefs began the third period on the power play and Keanu Yamamoto deflected in Elynuik’s pass to tie the game 2-2. The Cougars’ penalty woes continued, which led to the winning goal with eight minutes left. Jared Bethune had just about served a high-sticking penalty but it hadn’t quite expired when he jumped out onto the ice, and that did not go unnoticed. Bethune was sent back to the sinbin and with 18 seconds left in his sentence, Anderson-Dolan finished off a 3-on-2 rush for his 31st goal.
The Chiefs were 3-for-10 with the extra man. The Cougars went went 0-5 on the power play and have scored just 11 goals in 84 opportunities since Christmas.
“We had 24 shots in the first period because we had pucks behind them - it was a 3-1 lead and we didn’t do the things we should have in the second and third," said Matvichuk. “We had our penalty-killers trying to score goals instead of defending. We gave up more outnumbered rushes on our penalty kill than we did 5-on-5."
The Cougars (37-17-3-1) meet the Chiefs again tonight at CN Centre. Prince George is now just four points ahead of the second-place Kamloops Blazers, who lost 4-0 Monday to Portland. The Winterhawks are 12 points ahead of Spokane.
