Thunderbirds hold off Winterhawks in 4-3 win

KENT – The World Junior Hockey Championships robbed Saturday’s game between the Thunderbirds and Winterhawks of some serious star power. But that didn’t stop the two rivals from turning in an exciting back-and-forth game to kick off the second half.

The T-Birds scored four times in the first period and would hold on to outlast Portland 4-3 in front of 5,521 loud fans at the ShoWare Center. Seattle was led by Ryan Gropp and Jerret Smith, who each had a goal and an assist in the win.

Portland was playing without its top three scorers in Oliver Bjorkstrand, Nic Petan and Chase De Leo, who are all representing their countries at the World Junior Championships. Seattle was without last year’s leading scorer in Shea Theodore along with Alexander True, both at the Championships. The T-Birds were also without the injured Mathew Barzal.

Both clubs were playing short-handed Saturday night but it was the T-Birds who were able to overcome.

“Scrambly at times on both sides, but that’s to be expected in the first game back after the break,” head coach Steve Konowalchuk said. “Good win. Any time you beat that team it’s a good win.”

Saturday night was the fifth game of the season between the two I-5 rivals and the first won by the home team. The T-Birds picked up a big two points against a division rival that was ahead of them in the standings.

“It’s really huge, especially after the break,” defenseman Jerret Smith said about the win. “A lot of teams come out slow after Christmas, still got the turkey in them, but it’s really big to get a win, especially against Portland.”

The T-Birds were able to shake off any turkey hangovers they had and strike early and often. Smith got them going just over a minute into the game when he took a pass at the point from Calvin Spencer. With heavy traffic in front of Portland goalie Brendan Burke, he fired a shot that found the upper corner of the net for his third goal of the season.

“I just got the pass from Calvin, kind of they’re mucking it and Calvin got it to the point,” Smith said of the goal. “I just shot it, didn’t see where it went at all. I just found a seam I guess.”

The Winterhawks would tie the game midway through the period on a power-play goal by Dominic Turgeon, who was able to get the puck past goalie Taran Kozun. Kozun ended the night stopping 22 of the 25 shots he faced.

Seattle would then strike for two quick goals in what would end up being a crazy first period. Seattle took the lead back after Smith fed Justin Hickman in the high slot with a nice pass. Hickman fired a wrister past Burke for his ninth goal of the year.

Just over a minute later, big defenseman Evan Wardley blasted a slap shot past Burke to give the T-Birds a 3-1 lead.

Portland would cut the lead to one late in the first period on another power play when Paul Bittner scored his 14th of the year from the half boards. The two power-play goals allowed by Seattle continues a theme from the first half of the season. With the two goals, now 32 percent of the T-Birds’ goals against this season have been scored while they were short-handed.

It looked like that goal might be a big momentum boost for the Winterhawks, but even though there was less than a minute left in the period, the T-Birds weren’t finished.

With just 7 seconds left, the puck took a funny bounce off the boards behind Portland’s net. It rebounded right out in front and onto Gropp’s stick. He made one quick move and deposited the puck behind Burke for Seattle’s fourth goal. It was Gropp’s 15th of the year and gave Seattle a two-goal lead headed into the first intermission.

“Kind of a lucky bounce off the glass,” Gropp said of the play. “It popped out front and I was lucky it went in.”

When the dust settled on the first period, the two teams had combined for six goals. The four the T-Birds scored was a season high for one period and they out-shot the Winterhawks 15-8.

“I thought our guys came with good energy,” Konowalchuk said. “I think we were sharp in the first period and that was probably the difference in the game.”

The T-Birds would make the four goals stand.

Portland cut the lead back to one less than 4 minutes into the second period on a goal by Ethan Price, but that’s as close as the Winterhawks would get. Despite being out-shot 17-14 over the final two periods, and struggling at times to manage the puck, Kozun and the T-Birds’ defense did a good job mitigating the Winterhawks’ chances.

“They kept playing and played smart and I believe they’re in good shape,” Konowalchuk said of his team’s effort. “A good test for them off the break and we talked about them making sure they did something during the break and not just sitting around, and it showed.”

Seattle started the game only dressing 10 forwards. That number shrunk to nine when Donovan Neuls left the game early with an upper-body injury. That meant Seattle was basically down to three lines, which led to some of the scrambly play in the final two periods.

“For the most part I thought we kept things to the outside and didn’t give them a whole lot in the third period,” Konowalchuk said. “We didn’t push the pace as much as we’d like in the offensive zone, though.”

In the end the win was a big one as the T-Birds enter a stretch that will see them play eight out of the next nine games against division opponents ahead of them in the standings. Getting one against Portland to start the second half was big.

“There all big now, big two points,” Konowalchuk said. “We want to get momentum going and start putting some points behind us and building.”

The T-Birds will get very little time to celebrate this win as they hopped on a bus afterwards to head up North for a Sunday afternoon tilt with the suddenly hot Vancouver Giants. Faceoff is at 2 p.m.

Notes

• Portland goalie Brendan Burke did not play after the first period and was replaced by Adin Hill. Burke was not on the Winterhawks’ bench, so it would appear that he suffered some sort of injury. Hill stopped all 14 shots he faced.

• Taran Kozun had spent his tenure in Seattle with a plain white goalie mask. Saturday he debuted a new painted mask that features the Space Needle and several angry looking gorillas. The new mask was successful as he picked up his 14th win of the season.

Kozun and his mask will get the start again on Sunday, according to Konowalchuk.

• The Giants made a coaching change earlier in the month and brought in former Winnipeg Jets head man Claude Noel. They responded well by winning seven straight and had that streak snapped as they lost 1-0 in overtime at Everett on Saturday night. Seattle will have its hands full with a hot team Sunday afternoon.

• Ryan Gropp continues to pick up some of the slack left by Shea Theodore and Mat Barzal being away from the team. In his last eight games he has five goals and six assists, scoring points in seven of those games. He is now only three goals shy of matching his total of 18 from all of last year.

After several years of being dominated by their rivals, the T-Birds are now 4-1 against Portland on the season.

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