The Prince George Spruce Kings erased an early 2-0 deficit, got great goaltending and nearly doubled the Coquitlam Express in shots, but still lost Game 2 of their BCHL Mainland Division semifinal series.
Injuries to key players, missed scoring chances and a ineffective power play doomed the Spruce Kings to a 3-2 loss to the Express Wednesday night at the Coliseum. The series is now tied 1-1 heading into tonight's game in Coquitlam.
Kings head coach Dave Dupas lamented his team's wasted opportunity to take a stranglehold on the series against an opponent they've beaten eight out of 11 times this season.
"We did a lot of good things, we held them to 23 shots, we held them to three shots in the third period, but one of their three goes in and one of our 14 [in the third period] didn't go in," said Dupas. "I thought we outplayed them. But we didn't score on the power play and we didn't capitalize on all the chances we had, and it really comes down to that. It's really frustrating but it's a series now and we have to go win a game down there now."
The Spruce Kings have lost three key players due to injury, two of whom were playoff casualties. Brent Lashuk, a six-foot-two, 210-pound left winger who plays on the top scoring line, blew out his knee on the last weekend of the regular season and is done for the season. His usual centreman, Kings captain Bryant Christian, took a puck in the mouth in Game 1 Tuesday and was having the damage repaired in a dentist's office when the team bus left Thursday for Coquitlam.
"We'll see Monday, there's really nothing they can do for [Christian] now, it's too much of a mess in there, and he may be gone for the rest of the series," said Dupas.
Another crippling blow to the Kings is the loss of defenceman Karan Toor, who suffered a lower-body injury in the first period Wednesday and won't play in either game this weekend. He already had a foot injury to deal with and the injury he suffered Wednesday was a new one. Toor plays about 30 minutes per game on the top defensive pairing and with five goals and 31 points in 51 games this season, his offence from the back end is irreplaceable for the Kings.
The Kings gave up a goal just 43 seconds into Wednesday's game and were equally shaky in the first few minutes of the second period of Game 2. That will obviously be on their minds when they take to the ice tonight in Coquitlam.
"We have to come out faster and come out stronger and realize the first five minutes can cost you a game,"said Dupas. "We got back in it and had our chances to win it, but the reality is if we don't give up those goals in the opening five minutes we would have won going away."
The Kings won Game 1 on Tuesday, 4-3. In the regular season against the Express, the Kings won seven, lost one and tied one game, but four of those Kings' wins were by the slimmest of margins. For the most part, the Kings held the BCHL's top-ranked offence in check in the two playoff games, although Coquitlam's top line -- Ryan Rosenthal-Adam Rockwood-Corey Mackin -- looked dangerous and misfired on numerous occasions when they had the puck deep in the Prince George end.
"We've shut them down all year except for one game," said Dupas. "We blew them out once, they blew us out once, and all the other games have been close. But we've lost two-third of one of our top scoring lines, so it's up to the younger guys to step up and start putting some pucks in too.
"We can't relay on [Jeremiah] Luedtke and [Chad] Staley because they're getting the other team's best defensive pairing and best line all the time. They have a job to do also to shut down Rockwood and the highest-scoring line in the league. If we're going to win the series we have to get scoring from somewhere else now."
