Chiefs, Giants start over
David Rutherford delivered his mother Tracy an early birthday present Sunday night.
With his two goals leading the way, Rutherford – who was traded to Spokane at the beginning of last season – helped the Chiefs even their Western Conference semifinal series against his former team, the Vancouver Giants. The Chiefs and Giants split the first two games of their Western Hockey League playoff series in Spokane – Vancouver won Friday’s opener 4-1 and Spokane responded with a 4-1 victory on Sunday night.
Tracy, who billets Vancouver goalie Tyson Sexsmith, turned 50 on Tuesday along with Giants owner Ron Toigo, who owned the Tri-City Americans in the 1990s.
“It’s terrific that David will be in town (for my birthday),” said Tracy. “(Giants owner Toigo) is a good friend of mine and he turns 51 on Tuesday. I’ve known him since I was 11 years old.”
The Chiefs and Giants are essentially in a best-of-5 series.
The only potential problem is that the Chiefs play their next three games on the road, beginning tonight when the series resumes at Vancouver’s Pacific Coliseum. But the Chiefs have reason to be confident on the road. They won a league-high 24 games away from home during the regular season and in their first-round sweep of the Everett Silvertips two of their victories came on the road.
“It’s huge, right?” asked Chiefs coach Bill Peters after Spokane won on Sunday. “You don’t want to go down 0-2 and then be going on the road for three (games). There are eight good teams left (in the playoffs) and it’s going to be a battle of wills right down to the end.”
After an undisciplined performance on Friday night, and a strong showing from the Giants, Spokane played smarter and increased the stakes Sunday. But there were signs of weakness as the Chiefs went 0 for 7 on the power play and allowed Vancouver to score on 1 of 3 advantages.
What Peters liked was that his veteran guys showed up.
Outside of Rutherford’s two goals, import Ondrej Roman had two assists and Drayson Bowman assisted Mitch Wahl to give the Chiefs a 3-1 advantage.
Wahl, Roman and Bowman lead the Chiefs with seven points each through six playoff games – each with three goals and four assists. Rutherford has scored three goals and assisted on three to average a point a game.
“I need those guys on the score sheet,” said Peters. “I need that (second) line of Ondrej Roman-Judd Blackwater-David Rutherford on the score sheet each and every night, no different then I need the (top) line of Mitch Wahl-(Chris Bruton and Drayson Bowman) to show up.
“Our go-to guys have to be our best players this time of year if we’re going to advance.”