Kings Push Vipers To Game 6:

This is in todays Morning Star Newspaper:

Kings push Vipers to Game 6

Glen Gibbs/For the Morning Star

POWELL RIVER – From deflation to elation in just two days.
Not many B.C. Hockey League fans would have blamed the Powell River Kings for self-imploding after Wednesday night’s heart-wrenching Game 4 triple-overtime loss to the host Vernon Vipers. But rather than roll over in Game 5 of the best-of-seven Fred Page Cup Championship, the Kings fired two early goals to surprise the Vipers 4-1 before 1,137 fans Friday night at the Powell River Recreation Complex.
Game 6 goes tonight at Wesbild Centre, with Game 7 (if necessary) returning to the Sunshine Coast Tuesday.
From the opening whistle, the Kings jumped all over the Vipers, never giving Vernon a chance to get their legs going.
At 4:31, the Kings’ Neil Chambers worked his way down the right wing and drilled a chest-high shot at Andrew Hammond from a bad angle. Hammond blocked the shot, but Chambers gobbled up the juicy rebound and swept around the back of the net for an easy wrap-around.
The Kings continued to use their forecheck to test the Vipers’ defensive play, which had normally been its strongest attribute.
With his team under siege, defenceman Adam Thompson attempted to clear the puck, but it was intercepted by Kyle Bodie, who spotted Clay Harvey alone in the slot.
Harvey one-timed a blast that deflected off the crossbar and in at 10:13.
The Vipers had a great chance to get back in the game at 16:26 when Darcy Huisman was forced to trip Rob Short who was in alone on Kings’ netminder Carsen Chubak. However, on the ensuing powerplay, the Vipers weren’t able to record a single shot on Chubak.
Head coach Mark Ferner had expected a lot more from his players to open Game 5, and he fought to maintain his composure after the game.
“We weren’t ready to play,” he said flatly. “Our heads were elsewhere and the two goals that they got, we gave to them.
“Give them credit. Their backs were against the wall, but for whatever reason we just didn’t have enough guys ready to play tonight.”
Vernon responded with a little more zip in the second period. Forward Sahir Gill was set up by the Jones boys, Connor and Kellen, to fire the lone second-period goal, his eighth of the playoffs, at 8:04.
After that, it became a game of dump-in and dump-out until Harvey potted his second of the night into an empty net at 18:54 of the third frame.
Following the goal, there were a few innocuous exchanges between the two teams, but the Kings came out of it with a powerplay.
Ironically, Kings’ head coach Kent Lewis sent out his top shutdown players for the powerplay – which has been underachieving at nine per cent – but they wound up scoring.
Kings’ centre Justin Hogan drew the puck back to Reid Campbell on the left point, and he ripped one past a screened Hammond.
“That’s the challenge of any playoff series, and that’s forgetting the last game, win or loss, and going on and trying to win the next one,” said Kings’ captain Mark McKamey, of their ability to bounce back.
“We feel really good right now. I think that was our best game of the series, and there’s no reason why we can’t go to Vernon and do it again and then bring it home to Powell River for Game 7.”
Aside from the physical effort, it was obvious that the Vipers’ heads were elsewhere. Vernon captain Chris Crowell thought he and his team probably got caught up in the moment.
“I think the guys were looking too far ahead tonight,” said Crowell. “We were ahead 3-1, and I guess we thought that the series was wrapped up and figured that we didn’t need to show up tonight.
“So that was definitely not a 100 per cent effort out of us.
“Tonight we were just too soft on the puck and we strayed away from our systems a few times and it cost us.
“We’ll regroup and we’ll be better for Sunday.”
With the 12-hour bus rides between Powell River and Vernon mounting up, it begged the question concerning fatigue.Crowell shrugged and said: “It’s the same for both teams, whatever. You’ve got a travel day for a reason and if it is affecting us, and I don’t think it is, then it’s going to be affecting them too.”
The Kings outshot the Vipers 36-25 and Hammond had to be sharp but he also acknowledged the need for a full 60 minutes.
“It wasn’t the start we wanted at all,” said the Vipers’ starter, “and by the time you get down 2-0 in the playoffs it’s pretty hard to get back in the game.”
He also seemed to be fighting the puck early and admitted: “in the first I was a bit, yah.”
Hammond said the Kings’ offence was allowed a little more room, but Vernon has been doing a great job of shutting down the league’s best powerplay.
“Our penalty kill has been doing the things that don’t show up on the scoreboard like blocking shots and stuff, and I think it’s been more us than them.”