Silvertips score six to sweep Portland in first round

Published 11:20 pm Wednesday, April 1, 2026

The Everett Silvertips were in unfamiliar territory.

Through three games against the Portland Winterhawks in the first round of the WHL Playoffs, Everett trailed for a grand total of 39 seconds while taking a commanding 3-0 series lead.

However, after a Nathan Brown deflection on the power play early in the second period of Game 4, the Silvertips were staring down a 2-0 deficit at Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Portland on Wednesday.

With their season on the line, the Winterhawks came out strong in the first period — Nathan Free scored his third goal of the series at 5:42 — and while Everett created some chances on a pair of power-play opportunities in the opening 20 minutes, it could not find the back of the net.

There was plenty of time left when Brown doubled the Portland lead at 5:05 of the second period, but it was fair to wonder if a front-running Silvertips team with a comfortable series lead would be content to pack it in and resign themselves to trying to win the series in five games at home.

Not this Everett team.

Jaxsin Vaughan put the visitors on the board just over a minute later, and the Silvertips scored twice more in a 1:14 span later in the frame to take the lead en route to a 6-3 win, clinching the first round series sweep.

“We don’t switch much,” defenseman Brek Liske said following Everett’s Game 1 win on March 27. “We’ve been playing playoff style all year. A little more pre-scout, but other than that, we do our regular thing, and that worked (in) the regular season.”

After falling to Portland in three consecutive postseasons leading into 2026, Everett finally came out on top with their first playoff series sweep since 2016, which was also against the Winterhawks in the first round.

In last year’s second round, the Silvertips took a 2-0 series lead against Portland at home, but the Winterhawks ended up winning the next three games before squeaking past Everett in Game 7 after falling in Game 6.

This year, the Silvertips were determined to not let that happen again.

“One of our greatest strengths through the year is being able to be consistent home and away,” Everett coach Steve Hamilton said after winning Game 2 on March 28. “And when you get to the playoffs, it’s going to probably be a pretty packed barn, and for us, we just got to show up and do our thing.”

That’s exactly what they did. Scoring six straight following a two-goal deficit took everybody.

After the Silvertips’ vaunted top line was shut down in the first period — with just one shot on goal between Matias Vanhanen, Julius Miettinen and Carter Bear — it was two bottom-six forwards that tied the game up in the second.

Just 1:06 after the Winterhawks extended the lead to 2-0, Vaughan cut in to rebound a shot out of goalie Ondrej Štěbeták’s glove to cut it to 2-1 at 6:11. With the goal it needed to get momentum on its side, Everett started to create more consistent offensive zone time, but Portland protected the danger areas well.

Lukas Kaplan finally broke through to tie it 2-2 at 14:39, jamming a centering pass from Liske inside the left post. The 18-year-old nearly scored again along the right post moments later, but Štěbeták managed to cover it up.

Still, Kaplan remained a presence around the net, and his screen in front created space for star defenseman Landon DuPont to give Everett the lead at 15:53. The 16-year-old received the puck from Zackary Shantz behind the right circle, then went backhand to forehand through the slot to push it to 3-2.

Shantz and Kaplan teamed up to extend the Silvertips’ lead just 1:12 into the third period, with Kaplan intercepting the puck in the offensive zone and Shantz tucking in the deflection off Winterhawks captain Ryan Miller’s stick to make it 4-2.

Everett tacked on two more power-play goals from Jesse Heslop and Rylan Gould at 6:25 and 14:28, respectively, to put the game out of reach. Miller managed to score one last time for Portland with 10 seconds left, but it was all over.

“I think kind of trying to micromanage it being one game at a time is the biggest thing,” Gould said following the Game 2 win on March 28. “We have such a great group, and we’re a good road team and we’re a good home team as well. So just trying to kind of manage our emotions as the kind of ups and downs of playoffs happen, but it’s a great group and we’re just really excited.”

Outscoring the Winterhawks 25-5 in four games, the Silvertips dominated on their way to the second round, where they will host the lowest-seeded of the remaining Western Conference teams at Angel of the Winds Arena on April 11 for Game 1 of the best-of-7 series.

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Everett wins 7-0 in Game 3

After taking care of business in their first two games at home, the Silvertips stormed into Veterans Memorial Coliseum to capture a 7-0 win in Game 3 on Tuesday to extend the series lead to 3-0.

The top line teamed up for the first two goals, with Miettinen slipping a shot through with his backhand off a mini-breakaway at 13:07 of the first period.

Vanhanen made it 2-0 by finishing off a stellar sequence from defenseman Tarin Smith, picking up the puck in the neutral zone and displaying expert stick work to get around two defenders before dishing a cross-crease pass just 48 seconds into the second period.

Everett outshot the Winterhawks 18-2 in the second period, during which Mirco Dufour pushed the lead to 3-0 at 16:34 for his first WHL playoff goal, and four different Silvertips players scored between 5:23 and 10:09 of the third to build the lead up to 7-0. Goalie Anders Miller made 19 saves in his first WHL postseason shutout.

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One Up, One Down

Game 3 saw the return of forward Shea Busch, who had been out since late October with an upper-body injury.

A fourth-round pick to the Florida Panthers in last summer’s NHL Draft, Busch scored 13 goals in 12 games prior to his injury, and he returned to the goal sheet on Tuesday to make it 4-0 early in the third period. He also notched an assist in Wednesday’s 6-3 win.

However, just as Everett returned a key forward to the lineup in Game 3, its captain went down the following night. Shortly after committing a holding penalty 1:19 into Game 4 on Wednesday, Tarin Smith went down the tunnel from the penalty box with an upper-body injury and did not return.

The Silvertips managed to hold up rolling with five defensemen to close out the series, but any extended absence for Smith would be a brutal blow to the defensive corps. It will be a situation worth monitoring as Everett will have over a week to prepare for the second round.