Tips clinch U.S. title

KENNEWICK — It’s official. These Everett Silvertips are an expansion team no longer.

These Everett Silvertips are division champions.

The Silvertips completed their remarkable run from first-year afterthought to first-place conquerors, defeating the Tri-City Americans 2-1 Saturday night to clinch the Western Hockey League’s U.S. Division title.

Everett, which already broke the WHL record for wins by a first-year team, became the first expansion team in league history to win a division title.

"It sounds unbelievable," Everett goaltender Jeff Harvey said. "At the beginning of the year we were picked dead last by the Hockey News. Everybody else laughed at us and said we were going to do nothing. To come out and win the U.S. Division championship, there’s no better feeling right now."

Mark Kress picked the ideal time to record the first two-point game of his career, scoring both goals as Everett (35-26-8-2) moved four points ahead of Tri-City (31-26-10-4), rendering tonight’s game at Seattle meaningless.

"Can’t ask for a better time than this," Kress said about his two-point game. "Win this game and we clinch the division as a first-year team. Winning the division title is about as big as it gets.

"But I know we’re going further up from here, that’s for sure."

Everett opens the playoffs with home games against U.S. Division No. 4 Spokane on Friday and Saturday. Both games begin at 7:05 p.m. and tickets go on sale at the Silvertips box office at 10 a.m. Monday.

The Americans, who were trying for their first banner in their 16-year existence, now must get a result at Portland tonight just to salvage home-ice advantage for the first round of the playoffs.

Who could have predicted at the start of the season that Everett would find itself in its current position? Even though the Silvertips set lofty goals from the beginning, the sounds of jubilation emanating from the Everett locker room after the game indicated the players were fully aware of the enormity of their accomplishment.

"You’d have had to have been in the locker room, there’s a lot of happy guys in there," Everett coach Kevin Constantine said. "These guys are kind of castoffs from a bunch of other teams, wondering about their own hockey futures and whether they belong in the game. But from the very beginning they wanted to try to make a statement that they’re good, that they’re worthy of being in this league, and collectively they’ve become a very decent hockey team. I’m just really proud of them."

The Silvertips were well worth their victory Saturday. Although Everett won its previous two games, the Silvertips were not at their sharpest. But Saturday they played a nearly flawless defensive game, limiting Tri-City to 20 shots on goal. And if Tri-City goalie Carey Price hadn’t played as well as he did, it could have been a blowout.

"It was the best I’ve seen them play all year," Harvey said of his defense. "My hat’s off to them. They made it so easy on me. I only had 20 shots and they were all from the outside. That’s the best group of guys I’ve ever played with on defense out there."

For the second straight night, Everett found itself ahead less than a minute into the game. On the Silvertips’ second shift, Torrie Wheat and Jeff Schmidt, who along with Kress hounded Tri-City’s top line all night, found themselves all alone in the right corner. Wheat grabbed the puck, floated behind the net, then slipped a pass in front to Kress, who one-timed a shot into the upper-left corner to give the Silvertips the lead just 54 seconds into the game. It was Kress’ fifth goal of the season.

Tri-City tied it up 2:43 into the second period. Jason Beeman, skating in one-on-one with an Everett defender, had his backhanded shot saved by Harvey. But Beeman stabbed at the rebound and the puck flew into the corner to make it 1-1 with his 11th goal of the season.

Kress struck again in the final minute of the second period. Just as an Everett power play expired, Schmidt passed the puck in front from behind the net. Curtis Billsten was unable to connect with his shot, but Kress was there to clean it up to restore Everett’s lead with 36.6 seconds remaining before intermission. Kress’ goal was his sixth of the season.

Slap shots: Everett played without forward Chad Bassen. Bassen was scratched to rest the knee that kept him out of the lineup for about a month. … Tri-City was without third-leading scorer, Ian McDonald, who was also scratched with a sore knee. … A light moment occurred late in the first period when Mitch Love got the blade of his stick stuck between the boards behind Everett’s goal. It took a couple of minutes for Love and the officials to lodge the stick loose.

Silvertips 2, Americans 1