Vipers Bury Timberwolves:

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Vipers bury Timberwolves

by don klepp | Added 2010-01-09

Five power play goals in the third period capped a dominant 11-1 win by the Vernon Vipers over the visiting Williams Lake Timberwolves on Saturday.

When the dust cleared, 9 Vipers had put shots past beleaguered Vernon native Evan Dauenhauer, who also had six shots ring off his goal posts. Twelve Vipers had multiple-point nights. They were led by Connor Jones and Rob Short, each of whom had a goal and three assists. Their left winger, David Robinson, had two goals, as did Cory Kane.

The game was never in doubt; the Vipers out shot the T’Wolves 48 to 15 and limited them to just 5 scoring chances. The lone Williams Lake goal came when the score was 4-0 in the second period. Clayton McEwan’s point shot deflected off a skate in front, to ruin Blake Voth’s shutout bid for the second night in a row.

Third star Patrick McGillis got the ball rolling for the Vipers at 2:46 of the first period. On his first shift of the night, he came off the bench with fire bin his eye, won a battle at centre ice and fired the puck into the Williams Lake zone. Cole Ikkala and Sawyer Mick chased and retrieved the puck, which came to McGillis in the high slot for a one-timer that gave Dauenhauer no chance.

David Robinson followed with two first-period goals and the rout was on. In both the second and third periods, the shots favoured the Vipers, 17-4 in each period. Cory Kane (on a power play), Connor Jones, and Curtis Gedig ran the score to 6-1 at the end of the period.

That set the stage for a wild third period, when the Vipers tallied five power play goals. A frustrated Williams Lake squad, who had bowed 8-0 in Penticton the previous night, started to show their frustration. At 2:42, Clayton McEwan got mixed up with Braden Pimm. Then McEwan jumped Pimm who had fallen to the ice. Mike Collins came in to protect his team mate and got into a scrap with Brady Fuller. When referee Nick Swaine sorted out the penalties, the Vipers had a seven-minute power play to work with.

With that man advantage, they scored three times, on nice setups for Cory Kane, Kevin Kraus, and Rob Short. The trend continued, as Kyle Beaulieu and Stefan Virtanen took undisciplined penalties that led to power play markers by Braden Pimm and Dylan Walchuk. The Vipers finished with 6 goals in 9 power play chances.

The Vipers weren’t especially happy with rough stuff, but Coach Jason Williamson said after the game, “if teams want to play that way against us, we’ll fill the net with pucks.”

Blake Voth, who has allowed just two goals in the three Viper games this week, improved his league leading goals against average to 1.23.

David Robinson has now registered three goals and two assists in the three games since he’s re-joined his hometown team. At the same time, Connor Jones has moved to within two points of Mike Collins’s team-leading 59 points. Connor has the most Viper goals, 27.