Regals’ hopes of first fading fast

High Prairie goaltender Cannon Cunningham makes the save while defenceman Rollie Gladue makes sure Fairview’s Brandon Hill can’t corral the rebound during action Jan. 17. Fairview won the game 9-4.

Chris Clegg
South Peace News

Two home ice losses last week have left the High Prairie Regals in a dire situation if they want to place first in the North Peace Hockey League’s East Division this season. The Falher Pirates defeated the Regals 6-3 Jan. 13, then the Fairview Kings whipped the Regals 9-4 Jan. 17. The loss to the Pirates was especially painful, as the Regals (7-12-1-0) trail the Pirates (8-10-1-0) by two points in the race for first. If the Regals don’t win in Falher Jan. 23, they can all but kiss first place good-bye unless they can defeat West Division powerhouses Spirit River at home Jan. 24 or pull the major upset in Fort St. John Jan. 31. The Pirates would hold a four-point lead with a game in and hold the season tiebreaker with less than six games left – two left for the Regals against Spirit River and Fort St. John. Meanwhile, Falher has a last weekend home-and home series against Valleyview. The Pirates were full value for the win as they led 3-0 after one period and 5-0 in the second before High Prairie scored. Jason Bouchard, Deric Meunier and Evan Zawacki scored to give the Pirates the early lead. Kevin Desbiens and Darwin Payou added goals in the second before Stan Auger finally put the Regals on the scoreboard with 3:47 left. However, Desbiens added his second goal with 1:44 left and it was 6-1. The Regals were clearly not ready to play in the first period. They did not take advantage of short Pirates’ bench by playing physical. In the second, they found their skating legs and fired 24 shots on Pirates’ goaltender Nick Freeman. But all the money in the latest Lotto 6/49 draw couldn’t buy the Regals a few goals. Craig Van de Ligt and T.J. Cunningham scored third period goals for the Regals but the Pirates were home-free with the big lead. The stats favoured the Regals, who outshot the Pirates 46-28. They also clicked on one of four power plays while the Pirates were only one for six. Freeman recorded the win while Kyle Shantz took the loss. He gave up all six goals in two periods before Cannon Cunningham played a perfect third stopping all five shots fired his way. The Regals blew three one-goal leads in the loss to the Kings Jan. 17. A 2-1 first period lead, coupled by 3-2 and 4-3 second periods leads, quickly evaporated until the Kings took control in the third. The Regals led 4-3 in the second on a pair of goals from Lance Gauchier, who also added two assists. Rollie Gladue and Rocky Collins added the others, both on the power play. Darryl Peterson, Clay Bondaruk and Jim Sheppard replied for the Kings before they tied the game 4-4 on Tom Bondaruk’s goal with 2:18 left. Six seconds later, Ryan Trimble was in the sin bin for holding and the Kings took the lead for good on Brett Sharp’s power play goal only 12 seconds in the penalty. The game was decided early in the third. The Regals dominated play but experienced a painful bout of déjà vu as they did against the Pirates. The Regals stormed the Kings’ net but couldn’t buy a goal, partly because of good goaltending by Brett Dillman and a healthy dose of bad luck. Things turned when Tom Bondaruk scored his second goal of the night with 9:06 left to give the Kings a 6-4 lead. It seemed to deflate the Regals and the Kings controlled the game afterwards. Mathieu Keiller, Sheppard and Peterson also scored in the last six minutes to make the score much worse than the game was. The Kings outshot the Regals 45-33 and clicked on one of only two power plays. The Regals scored on three of five chances. The Regals play in Falher Jan. 23 in a must-win game before playing Spirit River Jan. 24 at the Sports Palace. Game time is 8:30 p.m.

Copyright © 1999-2005 South Peace News. All Rights Reserved.
No part may be reproduced without written permission.

View our Privacy Statement.
Send website suggestions to the Webmaster