The Prince George Cougars' playoff chances are like a Paul Simon song.
Slip slidin' away.
Their 4-2 loss Saturday to the Spokane Chiefs was the sixth-straight defeat for the Cats at CN Centre. They've gone more than a month without winning on home ice and now find themselves in serious danger of missing the playoffs.
"We knew coming into this weekend it was going to be a tough test for our club, these guys have had our number, and we needed to come out with more urgency," said Cougars goalie Ty Rimmer, who faced 83 shots in the two-game series against the Chiefs, both of which ended in losses.
"We had our chances and you have to give their guy credit, he made some saves. They have the No. 1 power-play in the league and when you get into penalty trouble it can snowball and that was the difference."
The Cougars trailed 2-0 after one period and probably deserved a better fate. They outchanced the Chiefs and had several extended stretches when they controlled the puck in the offensive zone, but were unable to beat 17-year-old Mac Engel, the same goalie who shut them out 8-0 a week ago in Spokane.
Engel was the WHL's goalie of the month in February and he showed very few flaws in his play Saturday while making 28 saves.
"It was a good game, the Cougars were a really hungry team, battling for playoffs, and we came out with the same mentality, getting pucks out and keeping it simple and it worked out in the end," said Engel, who played midget triple-A in Red Deer last season. "They're a good team and it was a playoff-style game."
The Cougars gave up just two power-play chances the whole game in their 5-4 loss to Spokane on Friday but were caught for three infractions in the first period alone Saturday and paid the price. The Chiefs had a two-man advantage when Dominik Uher swatted in a fat rebound with 9:55 gone. Late in the first period, with Jaroslav Vlach off for a check from behind, Rimmer failed to cover up a loose puck that lay at his feet and Anthony Bardaro got to it in time to score his 17th of the season.
The Chiefs won a majority of the loose-puck battles in the second period and some aggressive forechecking by Matt Marantz allowed him to chip the puck to Tyler Johnson, left unguarded in front of the net. He redirected the pass in for his WHL-leading 48th goal.
Vlach got the Cougars on board with 15:51 gone in the second period, snapping home Spencer Asuchak's pass from behind the net. Asuchak raised hopes of a better Cougar outcome for the sparse crowd of only 1,956 when he deflected Sena Acolatse's wrist shot from the point after a face-off win in the Chiefs' end with 11:52 gone in the third period. But Chiefs' defenceman Brenden Kichton had an answer for that, cashing in a power-play shot that got through Rimmer.
"We had our chances and just didn't capitalize," said Cougars captain Brett Connolly. "[Taylor Stefishen] had an open net and other lines had good chances and we just needed to bear down a little more.
"We took penalties we didn't need to and we have to be more desperate on the kills."
The Chiefs' power play ranks first in the WHL for good reason. It was absolute poison to the Cougars, who allowed three goals on six man-advantage situations.
"Goaltending was the difference tonight for them, I thought (Engel) made some great saves and gave them a chance of having success when they were on the road," said Cougars head coach Dean Clark. "We got ourselves down with the power-play goals they scored in the first, yet I thought we played a pretty good period. It was the penalties we took that hurt us."
Two months ago, the Cougars were comfortably perched in first place in the B.C. Division, five games above .500. Since the Jan. 10 trade deadline, they've lost 17 of 26 games, tumbling to their current 29-33-2-2 record.
"It's crunch time now, it's close and we have to start winning some games here," said Connolly. "We can't be hoping teams are going to lose, we have to decide our own destiny and come together really fast or it's not going to happen for us." The Cougars now rank eighth in the Western Conference, tied in points with ninth-place Kamloops and only three ahead of cellar-dwelling Seattle. Prince George has just six games left.
Sunday night in Chilliwack, defenceman Brandon Manning scored his 18th, 19th and 20th goals of the season to lead the host Bruins to a 6-2 win over Portland to move into sixth place. The Bruins are tied with Everett with 65 points, three ahead of the Cougars. Ryan Howse scored his 48th of the season for the Bruins, who have won five straight.
The Cats host the Central Division-leading Red Deer Rebels on Tuesday.
