Worst to first?
It's starting to have a nice ring to it for the Prince George Cougars.
The doormats of the Western Hockey League and the entire country last season are now division leaders, the sole occupants of first place in the B.C. Division.
Wednesday's 4-3 win over the visiting Calgary Hitmen was the fourth straight for the Cats, now 15-10-2-0 on the season. They'll try for their 16th win tonight (7 p.m.) against the Seattle Thunderbirds.
For the first time in their 16-year history in Prince George, the Cougars are a first-place team in December. With 32 points, they hold a two-point edge over the Vancouver Giants and Kelowna Rockets. Kelowna has a game in hand over the Cougars and Giants.
Charles Inglis continues to hold a hot hand, centring a line with Nick Buonassisi and impressive rookie Troy Bourke. Inglis scored two goals Wednesday, including the gamewinner, 9:53 into the third period. Inglis has six points, including four goals, in the past three games. The former Saskatoon Blade opened the scoring 6:45 into the game and assisted on Buonassisi's power-play goal late in the period. Brett Connolly, with his team-leading 21st, scored 52 seconds into the middle frame.
Jimmy Bubnick scored all three Calgary goals.
"We had a great first period, 13-6 shots on goal, up 2-0, and the power play got us a goal," said Cougars head coach Dean Clark. "They came back, which teams tend to do (against the Cougars) and we came back and got the go-ahead goal and shut it right down. We looked like we were a more mature club in that third period than we have this year.
"We've done some better things offensively as a group and Inglis's line is doing some really good things and that's what we need. We need secondary scoring from everybody and when you get that sometimes you're tough to play against."
Clark has had success against all the teams he used to coach. The Cougars beat Brandon, have a couple of wins over Kamloops, and now have a win against the Hitmen, a club Clark led to the WHL championship in 1999.
The Cougars beat Seattle 2-0 on the road on Oct. 29. Tonight's game will be the first visit to Prince George this season for Thunderbirds and the Cougars will be attempting something they haven't been able to do in four tries this season -- win both games of a weekend home series.
Clark plans to play both of his goalies this weekend and will start James Priestner, who looked sharp while making 29 saves against Calgary. Ty Rimmer will likely play Saturday.
The T-birds will have P.G. product Turner Stevenson behind the bench, an assistant to head coach Rob Sumner. Seattle's defence ranks fourth in the WHL, having allowed just 74 goals in 26 games. The Cougars will likely have to contend with goalie Calvin Pickard, a world junior team invitee, who sports a 2.67 goals-against average and .929 save percentage through 25 games. Former Cougar Michael Salmon is backing up Pickard.
Also in the mix for the visitors is six-foot-five, 217-pound left winger Mitch Elliot, a Prince George minor hockey graduate. Now in his second WHL season, Elliot has three goals and three assists in 26 games. Offensively, watch out for 17-year-old centre Colin Jacobs, a native of Coppell, Texas; Burke Gallimore, who leads the T-birds with 14 goals and 26 points; and defenceman Brenden Dillon, second in team scoring with 23 points, including three goals.
Forwards Jaroslav Vlach (broken thumb), Taylor Makin (broken collarbone) and Brock Hirsche (lacerated eye), are still out of the Cougars' lineup.
