Blazers get past Winter Hawks

From The Daily News of Wednesday, Dec. 5, 2007. . . .

For 30 minutes Tuesday night, the Kamloops Blazers had too much Mucha.
But the Blazers solved Portland goaltender Kurtis Mucha for three goals in just over four minutes in the second half of the second period and went on to a 6-4 WHL victory over the Kamloops Blazers.
The announced attendance at Interior Savings Centre was 4,118, the smallest crowd through 16 home games this season.
The victory got the Blazers (14-13-1-1) back on the winning track after they had lost three in a row. For the longest time, though, it looked like this was going to be another magic night for Mucha, the 18-year-old from Sherwood Park, Alta.
Mucha came into the night with a terrific save percentage (.912) for the WHL’s poorest team. And he got off to a great start, stopping 19 of 20 first-period shots.
“It would have been easy to get frustrated,” Kamloops head coach Greg Hawgood said. “They have a great goalie over there and you have to get a lot of pucks on him to get it through him. The guys stayed with the game plan for the most part, as much as we could.”
It was obvious that the Blazers’ game plan involved getting as many pucks and bodies as possible to Mucha’s neighbourhood. They ended up with 44 shots on goal.
“The guys were just consistent in getting pucks to the net and going to the net,” Hawgood said. “I tried to tell the guys to have faith and if they continued with that they were going to get rewarded.”
The Blazers, who had gotten progressively more dysfunctional in losing their previous three games, gave up the game’s first two goals — the 20th time in 29 games that they have surrendered the first goal.
“I don’t know if we shouldn’t just spot the other team one and get it over with,” Hawgood said.
Left-winger Ivan Rohac got the home boys on the board at 17:46 of the opening period, following goals by Portland’s Keith Voytechek and Matt Betker.
The Winter Hawks, who are 5-23-0-0 overall and 2-13-0-0 on the road, actually held a 3-1 lead at 1:36 of the second period on a goal from right-winger Chris Francis.
But right-winger Tyler Shattock got the Blazers back to within one just 34 seconds later with a goal that seemed to take a lot of air out of the Portland balloon.
“The longer they can stay in the game the better off they’re going to be,” said Kamloops centre Brock Nixon, who had three assists. “If we let them have that 3-1 lead . . . we probably would have been in some trouble.
“Good on that line to go out and have a great shift right away. That goal was huge.”
That line featured C.J. Stretch between Rohac and Shattock. And that goal came off a nifty centring pass from Stretch that found Shattock open in the slot.
“We needed a goal to get back there,” said Shattock, who later added a second goal, giving him eight on the season. “It was an up-tempo shift for us. They had the momentum and we got it back and I think we carried the momentum on from there.”
Kamloops kept the pedal to the metal and it paid off with three quick goals — from Stretch (11:10), Shayne Wiebe (12:24) and Brady Calla (15:14) — as the home side seized control.
If the Winter Hawks had any thoughts of a comeback, they were dashed 40 seconds into the third period when Shattock beat Mucha again. Betker finished up the scoring at 18:25.
While the Blazers did get the victory, they know they must find a way to play a whole lot better. Especially in their zone, where they allowed Portland to fire 31 shots at goaltender Justin Leclerc.
“We just went over (defensive) zone play,” said Nixon. “Not to take anything away from Portland, but they’re not a team that gets a lot of offence. To give up 31 shots, that tells us that something’s wrong in our (defensive) zone.”
Nixon feels one of the problems is a lack of communication.
“ A lot of time it looks like we’re killing a penalty,” he explained. “We’re giving them room instead of guys taking charge, calling out your guy and going after him.”
Shattock was in full agreement.
“In the next few days, I think we’ll go over our d-zone a bit,” he said. “We’ve got to get a bit better there. But, offensively, any time you score six goals on a goalie like that, that’s pretty good.”
Shattock had a chance for his first WHL hat trick when he hit the cross-bar with Mucha on the bench in the last 30 seconds.
“Whatever,” Shattuck said. “We got the win so it doesn’t really matter to me.”
JUST NOTES: Referees Sean Raphael and Colby Smith gave Portland nine of 17 minors and three of six majors. Kamloops D Mike Gauthier took the lone misconduct. . . . The officials missed an elbow by Betker that bloodied the nose of Kamloops D Mark Schneider at 9:34 of the second period. . . . Portland D Ryan Kerr (shoulder) didn’t return after a fight with Kamloops D Ryan Bender off the game-opening faceoff. . . . Portland C Aaron McGill, who was shaken up after a hard hit by Kamloops RW Mark Hall at 2:35 of the first period, tried to return but gave it up, likely with a concussion. . . . Each team scored two power-play goals. The Winter Hawks went in having scored four power-play goals in 14 road games.
gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca