KELOWNA, British Columbia – Chad Bassen stole the puck deep in his own zone and streaked down the ice, followed desperately by two Kelowna Rockets.
As the Everett Silvertips center/left wing crossed the Rockets’ blue line, he saw Kelowna goalie Kelly Guard, the Rockets’ version of the Berlin Wall. The 5,869 at Prospera Place rose to their feet at the one-on-one matchup. Should Bassen prevail, the Silvertips would tie the game at two goals apiece at 5:09 into the third period.
Bassen faked left and fired from close range, but Guard would have none of it and made the save with his glove hand.
And made it look easy.
The period before, Everett right wing Martin Ruzicka, perhaps shocked to find himself momentarily open and in possession of the puck, slammed a game-tying shot off the goal post.
In a series in which the first-year Silvertips are playing the best defensive team in Western Hockey League history for the Western Conference title, those are the kinds of chances they have to cash in on.
The Rockets, defending Memorial Cup champions, hand out scoring chances as often as Safeco Field has $1 Beer Night. They have the league’s best penalty-killing unit. Defensemen Shea Weber, Mike Card and Josh Gorges are rugged, smart defensemen, among the best in the league.
Then there’s Guard. He (along with Everett goalie Jeff Harvey) has to be considered the leading candidate for the league’s Most Valuable Player.
Between their superb defensemen and otherworldly goaltender, it’s little wonder the Rockets gave away a WHL-record-low 125 goals in the regular season.
What, then, can the Silvertips do to create more offense against this wrecking crew?
“Nothing,” Everett coach Kevin Constantine said. “Nobody has. Nobody will. So you have to hope to God that when you get some chances, you find a way to score. You’re not going to get a lot more chances.”
Although the Silvertips escaped Kelowna with a 1-1 split in the series, the Rockets held a 59-33 advantage with shots on goal, a preposterous 38-19 in Game 1, which the Silvertips somehow won, 3-2. In splitting four head-to-head matches, the Rockets outshot Everett, 110-61, yet the Silvertips scored seven goals to Kelowna’s five.
The numbers suggest spectacular goaltending and bend-but-not-break defense, the major calling cards for this team of castoffs.
Constantine was encouraged, even in Saturday’s Game 2 loss, that his team limited Kelowna to 21 shots on goal. Knowing his team’s chances of pulling the upset in the series was nil should it allow Kelowna to pound 38 shots at Harvey, Constantine was pleased that his team turned Saturday’s contest into more of a crashing, grinding game played on the boards and in front of the net in comparison to Friday’s open-ice offensive show.
“We played a lot harder tonight than we did last night,” Everett defenseman Mitch Love said. “We came in here and felt a little lucky to steal one last night after being badly outplayed. Tonight, the work ethic was there; the energy level was there. We just didn’t get the bounces.”
Certainly, the Silvertips have found more offense in the playoffs than they did in the regular season, turning the goal-scoring up a notch in the series against Spokane and Vancouver.
Kelowna, however, isn’t Spokane or Vancouver. The Rockets make nothing easy inside their own blue line. Even when Everett pulled Harvey in the latter stages of Game 2 to get six skaters on the ice, Kelowna seemed to have seven.
“I think it’s just one of those things where, every time you get over that blue line, just throw the puck on net and have guys go there,” Love said. “You go get a rebound or the defenseman might haul down a player and take a penalty. It’s something we’ve got to do a little bit more of to get a few more shots.”
For the Silvertips, the good news is that Games 3 and 4 are in the Everett Events Center. The bad news is that Kelowna is a great road team, sweeping Kootenay in the first round of the playoffs and taking three victories in Tri-Cities in the conference semifinals.
Then again, what harm can a thundering home crowd do to the Silvertips’ energy level?
The most interesting anticipatory aspect of Tuesday’s Game 3 will be the extent to which Everett continues to reduce Kelowna’s scoring chances, while somehow boosting the same for itself.
It will be fascinating to see what wrinkles Constantine comes up with and equally fascinating how this bunch of overachieving rejects from other teams executes them.
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