The Prince George Spruce Kings are in the middle of a tight playoff race in the B.C. Hockey League Interior Conference.
Just five points separates the third-place Salmon Arm Silverbacks from the seventh-place Wenatchee Wild and the fifth-place Spruce Kings are smack-dab in the middle of that five-team pack that also includes West Kelowna and Vernon. The King have a critical series at home against the Silverbacks this weekend.
A pair of wins over Salmon Arm would allow the Spruce Kings to leapfrog the Silverbacks in the standings, with two games left in Cranbrook next weekend to try to solidify a top-four finish needed to start the playoffs at home.
“We’ve put ourselves in this position to play meaningful games in playoff races at the end of the year and hopefully we can come out with two big wins,” said Spruce Kings head coach Alex Evin. “We’ve been very up and down in the new year and our goal for our team these next four games is to try to make them our best four games of the year.”
The Spruce Kings (25-20-4-1-0) are 2-2-1 this season head to head against Salmon Arm (26-17-4-2-0) and just about every game in the season series has been decided by one goal.
John Herrington continues to lead the Kings in scoring with 23 goals and 46 points in 50 games. The 20-year-old Lake Superior State recruit has been centring a line with Kilian McGregor-Bennett and Linden Makow.
On Friday the Kings will have the services of defenceman Ben LeFranc, back after missing two games on injured reserve, but will be without New Hampshire recruit Luca Primerano. The 18-year-old forward got hurt in the game against Powell River Feb. 24, and will be out of the lineup for at least the next four games.
