It was the second visit to Powell River and third game against Powell River Regals for the University of Victoria Vikes men’s hockey team and the results have pretty much been the same.
The Vikes handed the Regals a 7-2 loss on Saturday, October 18, at Hap Parker Arena but both teams and a couple of hundred fans left happy.
After a round of applause from the fans and handshakes between players, Vikes’ assistant coach revealed why his team was happy to make the long trip.
“A weekend off from our league and you get sloppy, a little lazy sometimes,” said James Gaertner.
Despite the lopsided score both teams drew a huge benefit from playing each other.
“You can’t really go into a game not playing hard,” Gaertner explained. “You can’t go in playing not the right way, kind of half speed, because you have to maintain habits for next week in league play.”
Four games into their schedule, Vikes have two wins and two losses while the Regals continue to build a team which is intent on winning a ticket to the Coy Cup in Fort Nelson.
Optimism for a better result in the third meeting was quickly dashed by a very fast and well coached Vikes squad.
Three first period goals scored on Regals’ starter Casey Jantz was just an indication of things to come.
Regals did close the gap to two early in the second when Brady Casparie slapped in his first Regals goal at 3:26 but the Vikes responded with two in the middle of the period to make it 5-1.
Powell River’s blast from the past, John Harris, stirred some memories when he delivered a solid hit on Vikes’ defenceman James Tindle and also scored the Regals’ second goal at 12:55.
Regals played hard right up to the final buzzer but they couldn’t add to the deuce while the Vikes added two more against backup Regals’ netminder Ryan Fairgray.
The game was hard-hitting in spurts but very few penalties were called which meant both teams got to roll their lines and use all of their players.
“We’re out of shape, no question,” admitted veteran Harris. “Guys like myself have only been on the ice, in game mode and practice mode, four times in 10 years and that tells you something. A lot of the others are in school. We get one practice a week for one hour and literally no games, so it’s tough.”
Without systems to follow, the players are running around, said Harris. “You can see that in the game. But these guys [Vikes] are fast and this is what they do. They’re probably training five times a week and they are good.”
Coach Rick Hopper agrees with much of what Harris said but likes the local approach of the Regals and is cautiously optimistic about his group.
“I was interested to see what all these guys could do,” said the coach of his first game on the bench this year. “There are some real young kids out there. I looked at Tod [English] one time and I think we had an average age of 19 out there and that’s a good sign. The guys have their sights set on a berth in the Coy Cup and that won’t be easy but it’ll be an interesting ride. They’ve got a lot to learn and conditioning is huge but the upside is really good.”
Perhaps more important than the win is, as Hopper happily observed, “Brady Casparie scores his first Regals goal tonight with his dad’s number on. This kind of thing is great.”
