The playoff races tighten back up, as the Victoria Royals ride their special teams and goaltending duo to a 7-3 win over the Portland Winterhawks.
After Portland won Friday night to take a 2-point lead in the standings, the Royals win ties it back up. Portland and Victoria go back to being tied for 7th and 8th. Portland holds the tiebreaker with one more win.
The Royals went 3 for 5 on the power play (although they did give up a shorthanded goal) and 6 for 6 on the penalty kill. Ethan Eskit was good in goal, stopping 18 of 20 shots, before he left late in the 3rd period. Jake Pilon, who’d played 51 minutes in the last 6 weeks, played the last 23 minutes and stopped 9 of 10.
It doesn’t get any easier for the Winterhawks, with a stretch of 7 games in 10 days starting next Friday.
| 1st 3:14 VIC (PP) Nolan Stewart (Heath Nelson, Caleb Matthews) 0-1 | A shot from the right dot by Nelson finds the net, the scorers kept going back and forth was to whether Nolan Stewart deflected it in front. Some non-assist kudos to Landon Young for holding the puck to keep the possession going. |
| 1st 9:34 POR (SH) Alex Weiermair (Ryan Miller, Carter Matthews) 1-1 | A great shorthanded shift by Weiermair and Miller, first ragging off time, then, after Matthews’s long outlet goes off Miller, he chases it down near the goal line, then sends it back to Weiermair for a one-timer from the right circle, a great finish. |
| 1st 10:02 VIC (PP) Timofei Runtso (Ludovic Perreault, Roan Woodward) 1-2 | But the Royals get it right back on the same power play. Runtso hits on a long shot from the center point. Reggie Newman was screening Ondrej Štěbeták. |
| 1st 13:10 VIC Max Silver (Cruz Waltze) 1-3 | Will McLaughlin turns the puck over in the Victoria zone, and can’t catch up to Waltze as he takes it down the left wing 2 on 2. Waltze gets a shot off that is saved by Štěbeták, but he gives up a big rebound to Silver, who beat Jake Gustafson to the net as the trailer, and he finishes. |
| 2nd :51 VIC (PP) Roan Woodward (Miles Cooper, Reggie Newman) 1-4 | The Royals move it around on the power play well. Cooper gets a shot from the right dot that generates a rebound and has the Winterhawks’ defense scrambling around. Cooper gets it back and finds Woodward in the high slot for a nice wrist shot. |
| 2nd 7:33 POR Reed Brown (Ryan Miller, Alex Weiermair) 2-4 | A highlight-reel goal for Portland on the rush. Weiermair from his own faceoff dot lifts an alley-oop pass to Miller at the Victoria blue line. He collects it well, creating a 2 on 1, and from the left dot he sends it across to Brown at the inside of the right circle for a one-timer. |
| 2nd 16:54 VIC Caleb Matthews (Nolan Stewart, Ludovic Perreault) 2-5 | Portland looks poor for most of a 4-minute power play, and then they get burned a little after it ends. Perreault in the right corner draws two Winterhawks to him, passes by them to Stewart behind the net, and Stewart quickly gets it in front to Matthews, who beats Štěbeták short side as he swiveled trying to find who had the puck. |
| 3rd 14:55 VIC Miles Cooper (Reggie Newman, Heath Nelson) 2-6 | Nelson pokes the puck past Carter Matthews to create a 2 on 1. Will McLaughlin makes two big blocks in front, but Nelson wins the puck from Miller and Matthews, and gets the puck behind the net to Newman. McLaughlin can’t block a 3rd pass from Newman in front to Cooper, and he scores. |
| 3rd 15:29 POR Alessandro Domenichelli 3-6 | On the verge of garbage time Domenichelli steals it from Stewart at center ice, takes the shot beyond the high slot, and wires it from distance for his first WHL goal. A nice one. |
| 3rd 17:25 VIC (EN) Reggie Newman (Heath Nelson, Miles Cooper) 3-7 | With the net empty, Cooper pokes it past Max Pšenička to center ice, and off an linesman, which sets up a 2 on 1 with the net empty. Nelson misses an easy chance, but gets the end board rebound and passes to Newman, who doesn’t miss. |
| Portland leads by 2+ | 0:00 |
| Portland leads by 1 | 0:00 |
| Tied | 3:42 |
| Portland trails by 1 | 9:28 |
| Portland trails by 2+ | 46:50 |
Pregame: Another big game. Portland looking for the weekend sweep after their come-from-behind win over the Royals. Which would give them a good cushion trying to stay in the conference’s top 8. The Royals going for the split and, just as importantly, stay ahead of the 9th-place Tri-City Americans and Seattle Thunderbirds.
1st period: Victoria won the period 3-1. Portland didn’t play badly, but gave up 2 power play goals, and Ondrej Štěbeták didn’t have a good period in goal. Shots were 10-10.
2nd period: A first-minute power play goal put the Royals up 4-1.
Then Portland’s biggest chance. They pulled within 4-2, and got a hooking/roughing double-minor from Henry Peterson. They were OK the first 40 seconds of the power play, but were poor after that, then right as it looked like they might catch another break with goalie Ethan Eskit going out, they played a really poor last few minutes of the period, and the Royals got another one. That turned the game right there.
3rd period: The Winterhawks were OK, but not really enough to challenge a 3-goal lead. Then it got a little crazy late, with the Royals making it 6-2, Portland coming right back, but not doing much with the net empty and the Royals scored to run it out.
| Top 10 | Stat line | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Nolan Stewart | VIC | 1 goal, 1 assist | The opening goal on a deflection (if it stands), and a nice quick setup to Roan Woodward for the eventual game-winner. 3rd in scoring on the Royals. |
| Heath Nelson | VIC | 3 assists | His shot created the opening goal, won a puck battle creating another. Missed an empty net goal but stayed with it for the assist. Snapped a 3-game scoreless streak. |
| Alex Weiermair | POR | 1 goal, 1 assist | He and Ryan Miller were by far Portland’s two best players, but didn’t get much help. |
| Ryan Miller | POR | 2 assists | |
| Timofei Runtso | VIC | 1 goal | A point shot for a big goal right after Portland had scored shorthanded, and ran the offense from the back line. |
| Ethan Eskit | VIC | 18 saves-20 shots | Played well before getting hurt. How serious it is will have a big impact on the Royals’ season. He has played a lot of minutes. |
| Miles Cooper | VIC | 1 goal, 2 assists | Set up the eventual winner in the 3rd, then part of two late ones. |
| Roan Woodward | VIC | 1 goal, 1 assist | Leading scorer for Victoria made it 4-1 early in the 3rd. |
| Caleb Matthews | VIC | 1 goal, 1 assist | Breaks a 9-game scoreless streak. A backbreaking goal late in the 2nd. |
| Jake Pilon | VIC | 9 saves-10 shots | Played the last 23 minutes after Eskit’s injury. Played well enough to avoid the drama. |
| Other notables | Stat line | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Carsyn Dyck | POR | 3-game scoreless streak. | |
| Alessandro Domenichelli | POR | 1 goal | His first WHL goal. |
| Max Pšenička | POR | 5-game scoreless streak. | |
| Carter Matthews | POR | 1 assist | First WHL point; between him and his brother the Matthewses had 3 points. |
| Nathan Free | POR | Snapped a 3-game point streak, although he played pretty well. | |
| Kyle McDonough | POR | 6-game scoreless streak and was -3. | |
| Ondrej Štěbeták | POR | 19 saves-25 shots | Didn’t have a good game, as has seemed to happen when he gets near .900. Might have been good to pull him after the 4th goal, with a dense schedule coming up. |
| Reggie Newman | VIC | 1 goal, 2 assists | 3 late points. A good presence in front of the net. |
| POR | VIC | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Record | 27-26-5-1 (.508) | 26-25-5-3 (.508) | Back tied for 7th and 8th. |
| Score | 3 | 7 | Victoria last hit 7 goals when they scored 9 against Vancouver last September 27. Not an offensive team. |
| Shots | 30 | 26 | Possession and chances weren’t really the problem for the Winterhawks. |
| Shoot % | .100 | .269 | The Royals definitely won the goaltending. |
| Power play | 0 / 6 | 3 / 5 | And this is where it was won and lost. |
| Even strength | 2 | 4 | Includes a Royals empty-netter. |
| Shorthanded | 1 | 0 | Only the 2nd shorthanded goal the Royals have allowed. |
Portland Winterhawks
A split for the weekend is OK. They really could have used a bigger cushion above 9th place, with a very dense schedule coming up and 3 of those games against the Everett Silvertips. They have a 3-in-3, another midweek game, and then another 3-in-3.
Victoria Royals
5 of their last 9 are against teams in the Western Conference’s top 4, so they don’t have an easy schedule, unless some of those games end up being dead. They’ll be holding their breaths about the status of Ethan Eskit, who by and large is their team.
Friday 3/6 at Everett, 7pm PST
Saturday 3/7 vs. Everett, 6pm PST
next Sunday 3/8 vs. Tri-City, 4pm PDT
Looking ahead: Wednesday 3/11 at Spokane, 7pm PDT
Next game versus Victoria: done for this season.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.oregonlive.com ’
