Trail Trash - T-Birds Crushed By Ice in Series Opener

South Island Thunderbirds, October 24, 2009

Let’s just say that after taking a few steps forward, the South Island Thunderbirds have taken a big step back.

The Birds made the long trek to Trail for this weekend's two game set after going 3 – 1 – 1 in their last five games and were justifiably optimistic after taking 3 out of 4 points last weekend from the BCMML’s then second place Greater Vancouver Canadians.  But playing on Saturday night in the historic Trail Memorial Arena (in the shadow of the Cominco smelter), the Thunderbirds were outhit, outworked, outshot, out-chanced and just flat outplayed by the last place Kootenay Ice, who brought the Birds back to earth with a resounding 5 – 1 defeat.

Most amazing is the fact that the score actually flattered the unusually sluggish T-Birds as the Kootenay shooters missed so many open nets, you would have thought there were force fields protecting the South Island goal.  Those missed chances, along with some creditable netminding by the Birds’ starting goaltender Ryan Waldhaus, kept the score closer than it deserved to be until the mid-point of the third period.

The Ice set the tone early by delivering five crunching hits on South Island skaters in the first six minutes (Alex Kersch, Sam McMullen, Dane Gibson, Justin Polischuk and Clay Carson being the unfortunate recipients) and then converted that physical edge into a wide margin of scoring chances, outshooting the T-Birds in all three periods.  Their physical style of play seemed to intimidate their guests and was aided and abetted by the referee, who only called the Ice for one minor penalty in the first period and another in the third, despite some fairly obvious charging and hooking offences.  But this was not a game decided by the officials as the Thunderbirds were slow moving and disengaged throughout.

The only goal of the opening frame came on the power play at 17:46, when Kootenay’s Dallon Stoddart beat Waldhaus from the edge of the crease after an excellent feed from behind the net by Carsen Williams.  Beyond that, the Ice enjoyed a wide advantage in shots on goal (11 – 6) and scoring chances (8 – 2).

South Island attempted to assert its own physical play early in the second period, led by forward Justin Polischuk who dropped a Kootenay defender along the end boards in the first minute of play.  That was followed by a good hit by Travis Stephens at the side boards but he was unfairly assessed a minor penalty for boarding.  On the ensuing man advantage situation, Kootenay notched its second power play goal, this one coming at 1:38 from affiliate player “M. Carr”, who scored on a point shot that was deflected past Waldhaus from directly in front.

Within another minute, the Thunderbirds cut the lead in half with their only goal of the game.  Clay Carson did the damage to notch his second goal of the season, finishing off a 2 on 1 with a wrist shot that squeezed past Kootenay netminder James Barr.  Assists on that play went to Cody Allison and Alex Kersch.

Kootenay had several chances to increase that narrow lead but either missed wide or was stymied by Waldhaus in net.  A couple of friendly posts also helped the T-Birds’ cause and the period finished with the score still just 2 – 1 in Kootenay's favour.  Shots on goal in the second period again favoured the Ice (13 – 9 in the middle frame and 24 – 15 overall).

The third period has been a good one in the last few weeks for South Island but not this day.  The T-Birds generated very little in the way of legitimate scoring chances, while Kootenay scored a total of three times and could easily have had more.

Through the first 9 minutes, the Birds stayed close and had a couple of chances to draw even with the Ice but could not beat Barr again.  That segment of the game was a pretty close checking one and as the period neared the mid-point, the shots were level at 4 – 4.  Clearly by then, the next goal would be huge and unfortunately for the visitors, it went to the Ice on a fairly harmless play. 

Playing at even strength, Kootenay had the puck in the offensive zone when it was played back to Sina Pourmokhtani at the right point.  His low wrist shot found the skate of Tryg Strand parked right in front of Waldhaus at the edge of the crease and caromed just inside the right post to make it 3 – 1 in Kootenay’s favour.

The score remained unchanged thereafter until the final couple of minutes of the game when Ice forward Troy Petrick tallied two more times.  The first came on a 2 on 0 rush from the South Island blue line after a Birds defender fell down, Petrick deking and then slipping a backhand through Waldy’s five-hole.  The other came with just 27 seconds remaining on the clock on a nifty dangle around and through traffic, finishing with a wrist shot from the left face-off dot that beat Waldhaus on the glove side for Petrick’s 4^th goal this year.  (A potential sixth Kootenay goal found the iron at the back of the net with 10 seconds left but it bounced out quickly and was thought by the referee to have hit the post).

For South Island Head Coach Rob Milliken, the one-sided defeat was “frankly humiliating” but also a real test of character for his players.  “This is the kind of adversity that our guys have to learn to deal with and respond to quickly.  We got exactly what we deserved tonight with that effort.  Now we have to bounce back tomorrow and demonstrate that this game was not representative of Thunderbird hockey.”

The loss drops South Island’s record to 3 – 7 – 1 and ended a 10 game unbeaten streak against the Ice, stretching back over the last three years.  Kootenay’s record improves to 2 – 7 – 0.  The teams face off again on Sunday morning at 9:30 AM at the same beautiful championship banner filled venue.

A game like this one only reinforces the fact that over the course of the BCMML’s 40 game regular season, there are no easy opponents or easy points.  With it generally taking at least 40 points to secure one of the six playoff spots, need one say any more about the importance of Sunday’s contest to get South Island moving forward again?