EVERETT – Before Wednesday night’s game against Spokane, the Everett Silvertips coaching staff stressed forgetting the past. The coaches did not want the Silvertips to let their success on their recent road trip go to their heads, lulling them into thinking victory could come without effort.
The lecture eventually sunk in, but only after 15 minutes. And unfortunately for the Silvertips, by then they were already in a hole too deep in which to dig out.
Spokane took a three-goal lead 14 minutes into the game, and Everett’s comeback attempt fell short as the Silvertips lost 4-2 to the Chiefs in a Western Hockey League game at the Everett Events Center.
Before a crowd of 3,590, Chad Klassen scored three goals to lead Spokane and put a damper on Everett, which was flying high after going 3-2-0-1 on it’s latest road trip – a trip that ended with a 2-0 victory at Spokane last Friday.
“It’s not the first time I’ve seen where a team comes off the road and has a bad start to their next game,” Everett coach Kevin Constantine said. “It’s something we talked about and addressed. You start to think, ‘Jeez, we won on the road. When we come home surely we’ll win and it will be easy.’ We warned them of that, but they weren’t listening.”
Chad Bassen scored his ninth goal of the season in the second period and Marc Desloges added a power-play goal early in the third as Everett (8-9-3-1) closed within 3-2. However, Klassen scored an empty-net goal with 33 seconds remaining.
Klassen also had an assist on Spokane’s first goal, scored by Ned Lukacevic on the power play just 3:47 into the game. He then scored at the 5:45 and 14:07 marks to give the Chiefs (11-7-1-4) a 3-0 lead.
“Once they got one, I looked down the bench and saw a lot of heads drop,” Everett center Riley Armstrong said. “You just can’t have that. You have to keep going, even if they do score. You have to keep your confidence up and think you can come back. I think we just fell behind too quick. We had tons of chances, we just couldn’t bury them.”
After the first period, the Silvertips dominated. Everett outshot Spokane 29-10 in the final two periods and had seven power-play chances during that time, including one with 3:05 remaining in the game. However, Everett could only beat Spokane goalie Jim Watt twice. The Tips wouldn’t even have had the chance to tie it if not for a pair of stunning saves by Jeff Harvey on shorthanded breakaways.
Everett finished 1-for-9 on the power play while Spokane was 1-for-4.
“I didn’t think they had us back on our heels,” Spokane coach Al Conroy said. “I think the ref gave them an opportunity to get back in the game that they really didn’t deserve. But fortunately we were able to kill them off and get the win.”
Watt finished with 33 saves to improve his record to 5-3.
Harvey had 20 saves and fell to 5-7-2.
“Your start is more important than your finish,” Constantine said. “Teams that score first almost always win, so you can’t spot a team three goals and expect to win, even if you’re brilliant down the stretch. We’ve always had the character to play hard all 60 minutes, but you still can’t spot a team that kind of score and expect to get points.”
Slap shots: Don’t say that Constantine doesn’t have guts. When the Tips earned a five-on-three power play with 18.8 seconds remaining in the second period, Constantine pulled Harvey from the goal, giving Everett six skaters to Spokane’s three. It made for a wild finish to the period, with the Tips having a pair of good scoring chances and the Chiefs nearly scoring with a length-of-the-ice bank shot as the period ended. … Spokane played without third-leading scorer Doug Auchenberg. Auchenberg, a 20-year-old rookie center who has seven goals and 14 assists, injured his shoulder at Tri-City on Saturday. … Everett’s first-period goal was a rarity. It was just Everett’s eighth first-period goal in 21 games. … Klassen has the longest streak of consecutive games with a goal scored in the WHL this season. Klassen scored in seven straight from Oct. 15-29.
First Period-1, Spokane, Lukacevic 6 (Gladue, Klassen), 3:47 (pp). 2, Spokane, Klassen 14 (Schell, Desautels), 5:45. 3, Spokane, Klassen 15 (Gladue, Schell), 14:07. 4, Everett, Bassen 9, 14:48. Second Period-No goals. Third Period-5, Everett, Desloges 2 (Baranka, Horman), 1:28 (pp). 6, Spokane, Klassen 16, 19:27 (en). Shots on goal-Spokane 14-5-5-24. Everett 6-13-16-35. Power-play opportunities-Spokane 1 of 4. Everett 1 of 9. Goalies-Spokane, Watt 5-3-0 (35 shots, 33 saves). Everett, Harvey 5-7-2 (23 shots, 20 saves). |
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