EVERETT — The Everett Silvertips were done and dusted. They were headed home for the Christmas break with their tails between their legs after giving up yet another third-period lead.
But one player was determined not to let it happen, and Kohl Bauml’s force of will pulled Everett back from the brink.
Everett’s captain scored a hat trick and added the winner in the shootout as the Tips beat the Victoria Royals 7-6 in a wild encounter at Xfinity Arena that brought down the curtain on the first half of the season.
In a game in which both teams seemed to already have one foot on the plane home for the break, Everett found itself down 6-4 after giving up three quick goals early in the third period.
But Bauml scored twice in the third to get the Tips back even. Then after Victoria had already celebrated the victory in the shootout only for it to be nullified by a video review, Bauml scored with a nifty move to his forehand to end it and send the Tips home happy for the holidays.
“It was quite the way to go into the Christmas break with a bang, I guess you could say,” said Bauml, whose hat trick was the second of his career.
“We’ve had a couple games the past month where we were lackluster in the third period,” Bauml added. “I was determined to change that either through words or actions. Obviously actions speak louder than words, and that’s just what I was trying to do out there tonight.”
Cole MacDonald added two goals and an assist, Patrick Bajkov also scored, and Nikita Scherbak dished out three assists for Everett.
Austin Lotz had a rough night in goal for the Tips, making just 14 stops on 20 shots. However, he stopped three of the four attempts he faced in the shootout as the Tips won that 2-1. Everett is 5-1 in shootouts this season.
Tyler Soy had two goals and an assist and Chaz Reddekopp had a goal and three assists to lead Victoria, which dropped its fourth straight. Regan Nagy, Austin Carroll and Brandon Fushimi also scored for the Royals, while Coleman Vollrath made 27 saves in net.
Everett finished off the first half 20-9-3-1 and in first place in the U.S. Division, three points ahead of Portland with three games in hand. The Tips won just six of their final 14 games after starting the season 14-2-2-1.
“Overall it was pretty good,” was Bauml’s evaluation of Everett’s first half. “We had a bit of an up-and-down last month after starting out really well. I think maybe everyone was just in a bit of a mental fog, so it will be good to get a break here. But it was a pretty good first half, 20 wins has to be top-five in the league. It’s a good start, but we have a lot of work ahead of us in the second half to raise a banner.”
The Tips are now off for nine days. The season resumes Dec. 27 when the Everett plays host to Vancouver.
Victoria, which was playing without arguably its three best players and its head coach — coach Dave Lowry and defenseman Joe Hickets are with Canada for the World Junior Hockey Championships, winger Brandon Magee was injured, and center Greg Chase was suspended — finished the first half 17-17-2-1.
Everett seemed in dire straits when Victoria took advantage of slips by Lotz in the third to grab a sudden lead. First, just after the Tips had killed off a penalty, Soy put a shot from the left circle under Lotz to knot it at 4-4 at 3 minutes, 11 seconds. Then, while the teams were skating four-on-four, Lotz overcommitted to Reddekopp as he bore down on goal, and Reddekopp had an easy wraparound to give the Royals the lead at 5:19. When Fushimi batted in a bad rebound at 6:53, it seemed all over for the Tips.
But that’s when Bauml went to work. He had already been the game’s best player when he gave the Tips life again at 7:55 by putting in a rebound. Then with time winding down, he found himself on a two-on-one with Carson Stadnyk. Stadnyk held the puck to until the last moment before feeding Bauml at the far post, and it was tied 6-6 with 4:06 remaining.
“We just didn’t want to go into the Christmas break in a bum mood,” Bauml said about the comeback. “We knew we had seven days coming up to recoup band recover. We said enough is enough, we were going to do anything it took and leave it all out there. We knew we had time to rest, so it was an all-or-nothing game for us.”
Then in the shootout, Victoria though it had won when, in the third round, it was ruled that Vollrath had stopped Stadnyk’s attempt. The Royals came off the bench to celebrate, but the officials headed to the scorers table and ordered a video review. The review showed the puck had crossed the line and the shootout went to round four.
After Lotz denied Dante Hannoun, Bauml was sent out with a chance to win it, and fittingly he finished it off to give the Tips a merry Christmas.
Silvertips 7, Royals 6 (SO)
Victoria 2 1 3 0—6
Everett 2 2 2 0—7
Silvertips won shootout 2-1
First Period—1, Everett, Bauml 13 (Scherbak, Leedahl), 7:46. 2, Everett, MacDonald 8 (Scherbak, Nikolishin), 8:31. 3, Victoria, Nagy 4 (Walker), 16:18. 4, Victoria, Soy 9 (Carroll), 19:52. Penalties—Hannoun, Victoria (hooking), 3:03.
Second Period—5, Victoria, Carroll 22 (Brown, Reddekopp), 1:51 (pp). 6, Everett, MacDonald 9 (Nikolishin, Scherbak), 12:29. 7, Everett, Bajkov 11 (Mykitiuk), 13:50. Penalties—Davis, Everett (interference),, 1:01; Juulsen, Everett (delay of game), 1:12; Miller, Everett (holding), 9:52.
Third Period—8, Victoria, Soy 10 (Fushimi, Reddekopp), 3:11. 9, Victoria, Reddekopp 2 (Soy, Fushimi), 5:19. 10, Victoria, Fushimi 7 (Reddekopp, Ibragimov), 6:53. 11, Everett, Bauml 14 (Juulsen, MacDonald), 7:55. 12, Everett, Bauml 15 (Stadnyk, Leedahl), 15:54. Penalties—Davis, Everett (boarding), 1:05; Dmytriw, Victoria (tripping), 4:29; MacDonald, Everett (embellishment), 4:29; Hannoun, Victoria (slashing), 9:59; Gagnon, Victoria (delay of game), 10:59.
Overtime—no goals. Penalties—none.
Shootout—Victoria 1 (Soy NG, Carroll NG, Walker G, Hannoun NG); Everett 2 (Bajkov NG, Nikolishin NG, Stadnyk G, Bauml G).
Shots on goal—Victoria 8-6-5-1—20. Everett 13-7-10-3—33. Power-play opportunities—Victoria 1 of 4. Everett 0 of 3.
Goalies—Victoria, Vollrath 14-11-2-1 (33 shots, 27 saves). Everett, Lotz 15-6-1-1 (20 shots, 14 saves).
A—3,188.
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