THUNDERBIRDS

Thunderbirds blanked 2-0 by Prince George for third straight loss

Nov 4, 2018, 9:31 AM

The Thunderbirds offensive woes continued Saturday night against the Prince George Cougars.

Prince George goalie Taylor Gauthier made 37 saves to earn his first Western Hockey League shut out as his Cougars blanked the Thunderbirds 2-0 at the CN Centre. It was the third straight loss for a Thunderbirds squad that suddenly can’t find the back of the net.

Seattle (7-6-2-0) was shut out for the first time this year but has only scored two goals during its three-game losing skid.

Goalie Liam Hughes was back in net for the Thunderbirds and gave his team a chance to win by only surrendering two goals while kicking out 25 Cougar bids. Seattle’s power-play power outage continued as it was 0-for-5 with the man advantage and has not converted on the power play in its past four games.

Prince George (7-7-1-2) converted on one of its five power-play chances on Saturday.

Cole Moberg got the Cougars on the board at 6:19 of the first period with his fifth goal of the year and that would turn out to be all the scoring that Prince George needed. Jackson Leppard would give the Cougars an insurance goal 6:57 of the second period when he scored on the power play for his fourth of the season.

The Thunderbirds were playing without center Noah Philp who suffered an injury during Friday’s loss to the Cougars, and without Payton Mount who is at the U17 World Championship tournament with Team Canada.

With the loss the Thunderbirds find themselves in last place of the tightly packed U.S. Division.

Seattle will have a week off before two home games next weekend against the Kelowna Rockets and Everett Silvertips.

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