Chiefs In Wild West Scramble Portland’s Victory Over Spokane Creates Three-Way Tie For Top Spot

The Portland Winter Hawks came into the Arena Friday night with a mild case of the blahs. Losers of two of their last three, the Hawks had squandered the lead in the Western Hockey League West and were clearly in need of a tonic.

They found it here in a hurry.

Faster than you can say Andrej Podkonicky, the Hawks built a quick lead, took a crowd of 7,943 out of it early and humbled the Chiefs 6-2 in a game of division front-runners.

The West, as a consequence, is a three-team logjam. Portland, Spokane and the Prince George Cougars a Friday night winner at Tri-City - share the division lead with 43 points.

The Chiefs are back at it here tonight with Tri-City.

Podkonicky, Portland’s 19-year-old Slovakian center, figured in four of Portland’s first five goals, assisting on the first just 4 minutes into the game and twice finding the back of the net in a stifling second period.

In the second period, Portland outshot the Chiefs 17-6, outscored them 3-0 and prompted Chiefs coach Mike Babcock to pull goaltender Aren Miller.

Miller saw 31 shots in two periods. He had 27 saves. Shaun Fleming mopped up in the final 20 minutes. Portland’s Hurri cane - Marian Hossa - got two by him in the third. But that was merely the exclamation point on one of the longest nights at home in Babcock’s four seasons behind the Chiefs bench.

“Give Portland credit for doing good things. But I don’t know how you can make good players play that bad,” Babcock said, shouldering some of the blame himself. “We were awful. They were the teacher and we were the student. I just hope we were awake in class today.”

The lesson seems to change with every meeting of these two. A week ago the Chiefs were the superior team in a 7-5 win in Portland. Did Portland, playing without captain Joey Tetarenko (concussion), have something to prove?

“There was something in it for us, too,” Babcock countered.

The Chiefs could have held sole possession of the division lead with a win. ‘

‘We gave up 44 shots,” Babcock noted, as the Chiefs were outshot 44-40. “When was the last time we did that?”

For the record, it was two weeks ago, but that was rare, and that, too, was against Portland.

Hawks goaltender Brent Belecki swept aside 34 straight Spokane shots until the Chiefs rallied briefly in the third period. Greg Leeb figured prominently in the rally, assisting on Perry Johnson’s goal with 8 minutes left, then scoring his sixth goal in his last three games 39 seconds later to lighten the mood at 5-2.

But Portland’s Hossa, who’ll have the world as a stage the next time Spokane fans see him, answered with his two third-period goals. Hossa will play for the Slovakian team in the World Junior Tournament over the holidays, and in February he will join his country’s team in the Olympic Games.

The Chiefs were down 1-0 after one period when Portland’s Brenden Morrow scored his 13th goal of the year, tucking a short rebound past Miller 4 minutes into the game.

It took Podkonicky only 3:16 of the second period to step in front of Brad Ference’s backhanded cross-ice clearing pass and turn that into the Winter Hawks’ second goal and his 14th of the season.

He had his second of the game and 15th for the campaign 1:18 later when the Chiefs left him uncovered in front of the net.

The Hawks put it away on Todd Robinson’s goal with 2:45 left in the second that put the Chiefs in a 4-0 hole at the second intermission.

“After they got their second goal we gave the puck away - we’d given it away numerous times - and the floodgates opened,” Babcock said. “The game was over for us at that point.”

Rarely has a Babcock team taken nothing out of a game at home. This was one of the few where you could wrap up the highlights in 39 seconds - the time it took for Leeb and Johnson to avert the shutout.

Babcock wasn’t willing to place all the blame on his goaltender.

So how good was the Chiefs’ goaltending?

“How do you evaluate the poor guy (Miller) when you hang him out to dry like we did?” Babcock replied.

Portland coach Brent Peterson said he didn’t see this as the biggest game of the season thus far. The win, he said, didn’t come as easy as it might have looked. Portland defenseman Andrew Ference, for one, took six stitches before climbing onto the Winter Hawks’ team bus.

“It’s never easy,” Peterson said. “Belecki played very well. He made the difference in the first period (stopping all 16 Chiefs shots).”

Winter Hawks 6, Chiefs 2

Portland 1 3 2 - 6

Spokane 0 0 2 - 2

First period - 1, Portland, Morrow 13 (Haupt, Podkonicky), 4:04. Key penalties - Podkonicky, Por, 4:06; Komarniski, Spo, 18:02.

Second period - 2, Portland, Podkonicky 14, 3:16. 3, Portland, Podkonicky 15 (MacLean), 4:34. 4, Portland, Robinson 12 (A.Ference), 17:18. Key penalties - Graf, Spo, 9:52; MacLean, Por, 12:17.

Third period - 5, Portland, Hossa 17 (Podkonicky), 5:36. 6, Spokane, Johnson 6 (Leeb, Cisar), 12:03 (pp). 7, Spokane, Leeb 18 (Cisar, Schutz), 12:41. 8, Portland, Hossa 18 (Morrow, Haupt), 16:02. Key penalties - Podkonicky, Por, 8:14; Jones, Spo, 17:12; Rossiter, Spo, 18:28.

Power plays - Portland 0 of 4. Spokane 1 of 3. Saves - Portland, Belecki 16-6-16-38. Spokane, Miller 13-14-x-27. Fleming x-x-11-11.

A - 7,943.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 2 Color Photos