Ice put chill on Chiefs’ first game

CRANBROOK, British Columbia – Spokane Chiefs coach Al Conroy would rather be unbeaten than be a prophet, but he didn’t have a chance otherwise Saturday night.

Conroy, who sang the praises of Kootenay’s Nigel Dawes and Jeff Glass before his team’s season opener with Kootenay, saw too much of both as the host Ice (1-0-1) downed Spokane 4-1 in a Western Hockey League game at the Rec Plex.

Dawes, the diminutive Ice captain, ended an attempted Chiefs comeback with a short-handed goal for his team at the 11-minute, 41-second mark of the third period.

The goal gave his team a 3-1 lead, which was huge with the way his goaltender was playing. Ice goalie Jeff Glass was simply outstanding for the second consecutive night, one game after he battled highly touted Tri-City goalie Carey Price to a tie.

The deciding moment of the game came in the third period, with the Chiefs down 2-1 but sensing an opportunity to tie the game when they went on the power play at the 10:51 mark.

The raucous Kootenay crowd had quieted down as Spokane began to apply offensive pressure with the man advantage. Just 50 seconds later, however, Dawes picked up a loose puck between two Spokane defenders at mid-ice and turned on the jets. Spokane defenseman Gary Gladue tried in vain to catch him as he quickly moved in on Watt and buried a wrist shot, top-shelf, glove-side.

For all intents and purposes, that ended the game. Spokane would not threaten from that point as Kootenay’s play got more physical, its crowd more vocal, and Glass became more emboldened. The Chiefs applied more pressure and put more shots on net, but each time Glass and the Ice defense repelled them.

Glass finished with 24 saves as he was the equalizer for his team’s young defense. Spokane goalie Jim Watt stopped 30 shots, but it wasn’t enough as Spokane played well but not good enough to win.

“I thought we played a real good game,” said Conroy. “We worked hard, we generated a lot offensively.

“Glass was spectacular, he made some big saves when he needed to. They got a bounce here and there and they’re definitely a tough team to play against when they have a lead.”

Kootenay had the advantage of having a game under its belt against the physical Americans, but it wasn’t that obvious from the start.

The Chiefs looked crisp throughout the contest and will get another shot at Kootenay Saturday night in their home opener at the Arena.

On this night, the teams started out the game evenly with a good 15 minutes of intense, well-played physical brand of hockey before things got a little chippy. Then, at the 13:51 mark, Spokane’s Myles Stoesz and Kootenay’s Adam Cracknell squared off. Stoesz ended up getting two penalties, including a 10-minute misconduct, and had another fight later in the game.

Spokane not only killed off that penalty, but then started to generate some offensive opportunities. The Chiefs controlled play for the final five minutes of the period and ended up out-shooting the hosts 11-7 for the period after they had been even for much of the first 20 minutes.

Glass was stellar, however, and that play continued into the second period, as he denied five more shots by the Chiefs in the first 10 minutes, including three on a Spokane power play that was more effective than it had been in the preseason.

Spokane then saw all of its hard work to that point lost, at least temporarily, when Watt tried to stop a breakaway by coming out of the net and playing the puck at the circle.

Watt failed to clear it past a charging Martin Sagat of Kootenay. The puck bounced off Sagat and landed right in front of him. Watt fell as he leaned backward to make a last-gasp effort to poke the puck away from Sagat, who collected it and calmly slid the puck into the empty net at the 10:17 mark of the period.

“It was an unfortunate bounce, but I thought Jim bounced back from that well,” said Conroy.

Just 1:07 later, Kootenay’s Dale Mahovsky scored the first of his two goals as he beat Watt glove-side with a wrist shot to put the Ice up 2-0 at the 11:24 mark.

The Chiefs then tried to pick up their goalie by striking back almost immediately while on the power play.

At the 12:38 mark of the second, Spokane’s Chad Klassen put in a rebound off the pads of Glass from a hard shot from the point by Scott Lynch. Glass had made the initial stop, but seemed stunned when the puck tumbled right in front of him with no defenseman nearby to clear it from the crease.

Klassen made him pay for his hesitation and slid the puck by Glass’ glove side, which allowed the Chiefs to cut the Kootenay lead to 2-1, and after an uneventful final half of the period, the Chiefs were still in the game entering the final period.

After Dawes’ back-breaking goal, Kootenay’s Mahovsky closed out the scoring with an empty-net goal at the 18:45 mark.

Ice chips

Scratches for the Chiefs were: Keyvan Hunt, Michael Grabner, Mike Senseman, Liam Couture, Jared Hough and Raj Toor.