WHERE: Rolling Mix Concrete Arena, Prince George
WHEN: September 16th, 7pm
For the second year in a row, the Wenatchee Wild opened their BCHL season with a 5-1 win over the Prince George Spruce Kings.
Wednesday night the Wild were able to take advantage of a few poor turnovers, and convert to handedly defeat the Spruce Kings.
Prince George had opportunities early on to initiate the scoring, but were unable to convert on three consecutive power plays, including over a minute of 5-on-3 hockey. The Wild led the league in penalty killing last year, and got off to a good start in 2016/17 as they stumped the Spruce Kings on five occasions.
Wenatchee followed up their opening game last season with a 8-0 drubbing in the Rolling Mix Concrete Arena, and Prince George will look to avoid that this time around. The offense seemed to struggle for Prince George on the power play in particular, and the lone tally came late in the third as Ben Poisson was able to muscle his way to the front of the net, and swat his own rebound in to break Nieto’s shutout.
He didn’t earn a star with a few Wild players having big offensive nights, but Nieto was key for the Wild. After letting a few early pucks bounce away from him, the netminder settled in nicely and stopped 28 of 29 shots. On the other side Liam McCloskey struggled in his first start of the night, but didn’t get much support on the goals scored against him. He was pulled in the 2nd after allowing four goals on 15 shots.
Four Fast Facts: The Prince George Spruce Kings are still searching for their first win on home ice this season — In three games the Spruce Kings have scored three goals — Prince George had one home win against the Wild last year — Of eight returning players, just Burnett and Epp have recorded points this season
Players to Watch:
Prince George: Stefan Wornig – G: While the Spruce Kings have struggled early on, the same can’t be said for their new netminder. Wornig has stopped 100 of the 107 shots he has seen in two and a half games played. The Surrey native earned an honourable mention last week from the BCHL for player of the week. If he gets the same workload this weekend, he could get the nod again.
Wenatchee Wild: Brendan Harris – FWD: As the returning scorer from last year for Wenatchee, Brendan Harris looks to be on track to do the same thing this year as he had two assists and a goal on Wednesday.
For fans not attending the game, the game will be streamed on FASTHockey and Mixlr.
