Chiefs Return To Championship Form Spokane Rides Cardarelli Past Defending Whl Champ Brandon In 6-1 Rout

Three nights ago, they were chumps.

Saturday night, they were champs, or at least good enough to beat the champs.

With Joe Cardarelli going off for five points, the Spokane Chiefs answered Wednesday night’s loss to lowly Saskatoon with a 6-1 rout of the defending Western Hockey League champion Brandon Wheat Kings.

The Chiefs ended their first losing streak of the season - and stayed on top of the WHL West heading into tonight’s 6:05 game in Seattle - after surrendering the game’s first goal. They stormed back in the second period with lethal special-teams play before 9,051 in the Arena.

A critical call by referee Mike Hasenfratz was the turning point that brought out the best in the Spokane penalty kill and power play.

Hasenfratz sent Spokane scoring leader Trent Whitfield off for the night for a first-period, checking-from-behind major and an accompanying game misconduct. The call at 14:53 of the first period - booed for the remaining 5:07 - put the Wheat Kings on a score-at-will power play for 5 minutes with the game tied at 1.

Spokane’s penalty killers, defenseman Joel Boschman prominent among them, promptly turned a negative into a game-changing positive by snuffing Brandon’s extended power-play and escaping with a tie at the first intermission.

Six months ago, the two clubs ended the WHL season in Spokane with a skillful league championship series won by the Wheat Kings. This was less fencing and more clubbing. When WHL scoring leader Peter Schaefer broke through with his 16th goal of the season at 8:49, the Wheaties had a 1-0 lead and the Chiefs right where they wanted them.

Spokane was 0-4 in games in which they’d given up the first goal.

But five minutes after Schaefer scored on the power play, Spokane’s John Cirjak tied it with his power-play goal, his first of two.

A minute later, Whitfield was sent off on a tough call that video replay seems to confirm was harsh.

“It wasn’t a good call,” Wheat Kings GM Kelly McCrimmon confirmed, “but he spent the rest of the night feeling bad about it.”

The inference from the Brandon perspective is that the referee made more than one make-up call on Spokane’s behalf.

But in the end it wasn’t about penalties, Brandon coach Bob Lowes said. This was about commitment. And the Chiefs had it where the Wheat Kings didn’t, on the power play and the penalty kill. Spokane scored on 5 of 11 opportunities with the extra attacker.

Still worked up over Whitfield’s banishment, the Chiefs and the crowd took full advantage of the momentum-building penalty kill of the previous period. Aided by a series of penalties incurred by Brandon defenseman Johnathan Aitken, they jumped on the road-weary Wheat Kings to start the second period.

After picking up a questionable elbowing minor and compounding it by running off at the mouth and attracting an unsportsmanlike conduct call, Aitken gave the Chiefs a pair of power-play chances.

Aitken watched from the penalty box when Derek Schutz and Greg Leeb scored within 42 seconds, each on the power play, to put the Chiefs up 3-1.

A first-round draft pick of the Boston Bruins, Aitken was sent off again for high-sticking, this time at 3:40 of the second, and again the Chiefs made him pay - Cirjak scoring to make it 4-1.

The Chiefs (11-5-1) sent Brandon to its third straight loss. The Wheat Kings fell to 11-8.

, DataTimes MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: COMING UP Tonight: Spokane Chiefs at Seattle Thunderbirds, 6:05.