Vees advance to Okanagan Cup championship game

Friday the 13th presented an eerie playoff vibe in two Okanagan cities – despite the fact the BCHL regular season isn’t slated to start until Dec. 4.

With the Okanagan Cup preseason award on the line, it was semifinal night in Penticton, where the Vees knocked off Salmon Arm 5-2, and in West Kelowna, where the Warriors fell 2-0 to Vernon.

Penticton may have dominated the 12-game BCHL preseason tournament with 11 wins, giving up just 19 goals, and finishing with a plus-38 goal differential. But the favourites were in tough against the 3-8-1 Silverbacks in the early going.

Penticton didn’t register its first shot on goal until the 11-minute mark, and had been outshot 6-1 when the teams reached the TV time-out at 12:19.

But Penticton came away from that break with a power play, and just 14 seconds in, Quinn Hutson blasted a centering pass from Tri City Americans loaner Conner Bouchard past goalie Cole Schwebius, on loan from the Kelowna Rockets, and the Vees were up 1-0.

“What was said (during the break) was the last couple of days in practice we knew we had to score a goal on the power play tonight. We had gone, I think, four games in a row without getting a power play goal,” said Vees head coach Fred Harbinson. “It was one of the things we talked about, and we made a couple of adjustments on our units, and the look, and it paid off right away.”

For Hutson, it was his league-leading 10th in 13 preseason games.

Penticton made it 2-0 just 1:42 into the second period.

Jacob Quillan took a feed from Ryan Upson and beat Schwebius to the open side for a 2-0 lead. Hutson earned the second assist.

The Vees held a two-goal lead, despite being outshot 12-5 at the time.

The Silverbacks finally hit the scoreboard 15:13 into the second period, needing just 13 second of a power play for Simon Tassy to beat Yaniv Perets, who had stopped all 18 shots until that point, and it was a 2-1 game.

The Vees struck again early in the third period to regain the two-goal lead. WHL’er Bouchard took a feed from Matteo Costantini and beat Schwebius at 2:27 to make it a 3-1 game. It was Bouchard’s first goal as a Vee.

Penticton appeared to put the game out of reach 6:57 into the third, when Bouchard scored just nine seconds into a power play to make it a 4-1 game.

“Lotta energy, loves to play the game,” said Harbinson of Bouchard, who was an affiliate player with the Vees as a 15 and 16 year old. “You can see it. It’s contagious when he’s out there.”

The Silverbacks cut the lead in half with eight minutes to go when Logan Shaw flipped the puck over a sprawled Perets.

But just over a minute later, Luc WIlson scored his fifth of the Okanagan Cup to restore the three goal lead, and a 5-2 final.

Yaniv Perets was outstanding in net, making 35 of 37 saves.

“He was great,” said Harbinson. “We’ve had great goaltending all the way through. That didn’t surprise me tonight.”

Matteo Costantini had three assists, and leads the Vees with 19 points in 13 games, one point behind former Vee Alex DiPaolo of the Victoria Grizzlies.

“We wanted to have the chance to play in the final. You’re 11 and 1 going into the game tonight. Clearly, all that gets thrown out the window when it’s a one-game shot. The last thing we wanted to do was play in a consolation game,” said Harbinson. “Now, we’ve given ourselves a chance to play either Vernon or West Kelowna at home Saturday night.”

It will be the Vees and Vernon Vipers Saturday at 6 pm at South Okanagan Events Centre.

You can watch the game on bchltv.ca.