Spurgeon quarterbacks Chiefs’ win

There are multiple reasons why defenseman Jared Spurgeon quarterbacks the Spokane Chiefs’ power-play unit, and he always seems to pick the best time to showcase his talent.

Thankfully, he picked Tuesday night to do just that.

Spurgeon assisted on Drayson Bowman’s game-winning goal at the 17 minute, 28 second mark in the third period as the Spokane Chiefs came back for a 2-1 Western Hockey League victory over the Kelowna Rockets at the Arena.

“That was a great pass – it was the easiest job I’ve had,” said Bowman, whose 36 goals lead the team and rank second in the league.

Judd Blackwater, who assisted on both Spokane goals, passed the puck to Spurgeon in the right slot. Spurgeon split two defensemen and skated around another to find Bowman camping in the lower left slot.

Bowman one-timed it and went top shelf past Kelowna goalie Torrie Jung, who was solid in a 26-save performance.

“He has real good on-ice vision and a superior hockey sense in my opinion,” Chiefs coach Bill Peters said of the 18-year-old Spurgeon, who is generously listed as 5-foot-9, 170 pounds. “He competes very hard, he’s a pit bull out there and he’s an undersized guy but it doesn’t hold him back one bit.”

League-leading scorer Colin Long put the Rockets (33-19-2-6) on the board with a power-play goal from the high slot 10 minutes into the first.

After a dull, penalty-free and scoreless second period, Evan Bloodoff was whistled for a checking-from-behind penalty midway through the third to put the Chiefs on their second power play.

Blackwater centered a feed to David Rutherford, who maneuvered around Brandon McMillan and went forehand to backhand to tie the game at 1 at 10:31.

All in all, the win was a result of patience and poise late in the game.

“It’s nice to see, because if you get off track and try and do things individually then you’re not going to get rewarded,” said Peters. “You’ve got to give Kelowna credit, they came out and established their game early and took it to us, but in the second half of the game I thought we played a little bit better.

“You’ve got to be patient and compete for 60 minutes and I thought our guys did a good job staying with it.”

The victory pulls the Chiefs (41-13-1-5) within four points of the U.S. Division-leading Tri-City Americans, who have one game in hand and don’t play until they meet the Chiefs on Saturday. If the Chiefs win tonight’s game at Everett and Friday against the Silvertips at the Arena, the teams would be tied with 92 points heading into another Saturday night showdown.

“We want to battle back and get back up on Tri-City,” said Chiefs captain Chris Bruton.

“Come Saturday, we’ll have a game in hand but we want to be even in points and we want to get one here at home.”

Ice chips

Chiefs forward Mitch Wahl served the final game of a two-game suspension for a match penalty from last Friday’s game at Everett when he cross checked Jonathan Harty in the face. … Chiefs forward Curtis Kelner remains sidelined with a shoulder injury but has been upgraded to day-to-day and expects to play this weekend. … Collin Bowman, a rookie defenseman for Kelowna, is the younger brother of Spokane forward Drayson Bowman. Collin spent last season with the Coeur d’Alene Lakers of the NorPac league with Chiefs rookie Tyler Johnson. The Bowman brothers dropped their gloves and fought each other to kick off the beginning of the third period.