Chiefs Pound Bewildered Americans
It was a foregone conclusion disguised as a hockey game.
The young, beat-up, struggling Tri-City Americans had no chance and little hope of winning Saturday night.
The one thing they did do in a 6-1 loss to the Spokane Chiefs was deny a record crowd a free lunch.
“At least we made somebody angry here tonight,” said Tri-City coach Rick Lanz, who was resigned to a long night, with three players including his two alternate captains missing with injuries.
The only disappointment to a record crowd of 10,737 in the Arena was having their chants of “Pizza! Pizza! Pizza!” go unheeded. Ticket stubs are redeemable for free lunch pizza any time the Chiefs score seven or more goals.
The Chiefs for the first time pulled down the portable seats behind the east net that will be used during the Memorial Cup tournament, adding to the normal capacity of 10,455.
Spokane’s Brad Ference kept the fans content enough with a couple of 60-foot slap shots on the way to a three-point night.
“Usually they hit something,” said Ference, meaning his one-timers from the point usually hit something other than the back of the net. “The second one, I just put on net and the goalie misplayed it.”
That sums it up. It was a sad night for rookie goaltender Blair Faulkner, who had three of the 12 shots he faced go in.
Ference knocked in his first with 4:05 left in the first period.
It’s the last the fans will see of the Chiefs in the Arena until March 11 when the Prince George Cougars come in for Spokane’s next-to-last regular-season home game.
After Ference got the Chiefs started, Derek Schutz scorched the Ams with a short-handed goal inside the final minute of the first period. Faulkner left the crease in an aborted try to clear the puck, only to have Schutz beat him to it. Schutz reached around the goalie to swat the puck into the empty net with 12 seconds left in the first.
That was enough. The Ams were without their two alternate captains Scott Gomez, who’s out with a concussion suffered in Friday night’s 3-2 loss to Seattle, and David Darguzas, sidelined with a season-ending broken arm.
After Ference drilled another one-timer through Faulkner’s pads a minute into the second period, Faulkner’s night was over.
David Haun knocked aside 17 of 18 shots in goal for the Chiefs, who stretched their lead over third-place Prince George to seven points - 3-1/2 games - with six games remaining.
“We needed the points,” Chiefs coach Mike Babcock said. “We’ve known for a while that we’ll probably be playing Kelowna (in the playoffs). We’re excited about that. The big thing tonight was, they didn’t generate anything.”
Small wonder. The Americans had 16 skaters available. Some are of midget hockey age. The Ams are the league’s youngest team.
“Going against a team like this, in this building, is a big mountain to climb,” Lanz said.
Zenith Komarniski, Trent Whitfield and Dan Vandermeer also scored for the Chiefs (42-20-4).
Jarrett Thompson countered for Tri-City. Later Thompson would leave the game after taking a tough, clean open-ice hit from Spokane’s Ron Grimard.
, DataTimes