Vipers Weather Storm To Control Series:

This is in todays Morning Star Newspaper:

Vipers weather Storm to control series

Birthday boy Sahir Gill was supposed to be the one receiving all the presents on Tuesday. Instead, the 17-year-old sniper gift-wrapped a commanding 3-0 Doyle Cup Pacific championship series lead for the Vernon Vipers by pocketing the winner in Game 3 against the Grande Prairie Storm at the Canada Games Arena.
Gill, who also fired a clutch triple-overtime winner against the Powell River Kings in the B.C. Hockey League championship, was in good position to whack home the rebound past netminder Chad Carder, off an Adam Thompson point shot at 8:42 of the second period.
"The guys went out, our first game here in Grande Prairie, it's not going to be pretty always but we got it done," smiled the Terrace product, of the Vipers' effort. "The whole team is close off the ice, and it carries onto the ice.
"It's a different ice surface than the Civic Arena, and even (Wesbild Centre). The crowd is pretty loud, there are a lot of people in there and it just took a while to get used to it and figure out the bumps and the way the rink works. After that I think we calmed down and played our game."
The Storm had their best effort of the series by far, playing more physical, creating neutral zone turnovers and driving hard to the net to create chances.
Tanner Fritz had a glorious chance in the first minute when he was left alone in front of netminder Andrew Hammond, but he chipped the puck over the wide open net. Hammond stopped Dennis Rix at the side of the net on a Morgan McLean shot a few minutes later.
"We were a little tentative, no question," said Vipers' head coach Mark Ferner. "We haven't played here and we were on our heels a little bit. Our goal was to come out of that first 10 minutes even, and just try to slow it down to our pace. That's something you do on the road is dictate the pace.
"We had lots of changes early and just tried to take the crowd out of it."
Then, with Vipers' forward Rob Short in the box for tripping, BCHL Player-of-the-Week Connor Jones stripped Storm defender Bobby Tyson at the blueline to go in alone on Carder (35 saves), scoring his second of the series at 6:58 of the first period.
"That shorthanded goal was a backbreaker, obviously," said Storm head coach Mike Vandekamp. "We were pretty tentative with the puck and turned it over in the neutral zone."
The Storm answered back 38 seconds later on the same powerplay, as McLean fed a wide open Carter Rowney at the side of the net with a short seam pass for the easy tap-in.
The Vipers started to gather momentum in the second frame. Cameron Brodie nearly got a lucky one on a routine dump-in on an early powerplay. His shot hit a linesman's skate on side wall and it nearly deflected straight in as Carder came out to play the puck and had to lunge back to make the save.
Jones had the best early chance, as he turned a storm d-man inside out before firing a good low shot that Carder turned aside. Carder then came up with a great save off a faceoff as Cory Kane drew back to Bryce Kakoske, who flicked a quick shot on net through traffic.
Up by a goal, the Vipers went into their patented shutdown mode in the third period, but the Storm wouldn't go away.
Cody Ikkala had to come up with a great stick on Doug Reid to deny him an open net tap in off a rebound. At the other end, Adam Young pulled off a diving poke check to strip Alaska product Kory Roy of the puck on clear breakaway.
As the period wore on, the Storm applied more and more pressure, but the Vipers did a good job of clogging lanes, blocking shots and keeping puck to the perimeter. When pucks did get through, Hammond was dialed in. The White Rock product came up with an all-world, circus-like save on Zahn Raubenheimer with two minutes remaining.
"It's called the Spoke," grinned Hammond, crediting former WHL netminder Kevin Opsahl for teaching him the move in summer goalie school. "It's something Graeme (Vipers' backup netminder Gordon) and I fool around with in practice, but you don't get too many opportunities to pull it.
"It happened pretty quick. There was a turnover at the blueline and I was deep in my net so I couldn't really come out and challenge too much, so it was really the only option I had."
Shortly after Hammond's show-stopper, the Vipers caught a huge break as referee Dion Pollard handed Morgan McLean a minor for slashing, allowing the Snakes to ice the game with relative ease.
"In the second period, they did a nice job of protecting the puck in our end," said Vandekamp. "They did a nice job of not necessarily creating a ton of offence, but just putting us back on our heels and keeping us in our own end.
"In the third period, we played with the most spirit and passion that we have since the series started. It seemed to create some offensive opportunities, we just didn't bury them. Their goaltender made some real nice saves... a couple tough bounces, a couple tough breaks, and unfortunately a penalty called with two minutes left in the game.
"We're going to take this as if we were starting a new series (Wednesday). The games that are done are done. We've got four games to play and we've won four in a row before. We won four in a row against a good team (Spruce Grove Saints) just one series ago."
The Vipers will look to sweep the Storm Wednesday night at Canada Games Arena to earn a berth to the Royal Bank Cup Junior A Championship, May 2-10 in Victoria, but Ferner hasn't booked the bus quite yet.
"We're happy where we're sitting, but we know we've got a lot of work to do. That last one always seems to be the toughest, but we're going to do our best."
The Vipers' Ryan Santana played his first game since sustaining an upper-body injury in the BCHL Interior Conference final against the Salmon Arm SilverBacks. He took James Kerr's place, who is day-to-day with an injury he sustained after his Game 2 fight with Darren Kramer.