The first five minutes of the opening period had the Prince George Spruce Kings (9-3-0-1) stamped all over it, and it proved to be enough as they scored two early goals and then put a defensive front for the rest of the game to hold on for a 2-1 victory over the Wenatchee Wild (2-8-0-1) Saturday night at Kopar Memorial Arena.
After scoring the game-winner in Friday night’s 4-3 come-from-behind win over the Wild, Linden Makow opened the scoring Saturday night at 2:26 with the Spruce Kings on the powerplay. The goal marked Makow’s seventh of the season. Luca Primerano and Jack Stockfish earned the helpers on the play.
Less than a minute and a half later, Kilian McGregor-Bennett made it a 2-0 lead at 3:52. The goal was his third of the season with John Herrington earning his sixth assist of the season.
Prince George committed a trio of penalties in the opening period but it was the third one, a tripping call against Amran Bhabra, that led to a puck finding the back of the net for Wenatchee.
Luke Weilandt scored his fifth of the season with his side on the man advantage before the period closed out. Mario Gasparini and Christian Kim assisted the play to make the score 2-1 at the end of the first 20 minutes of play.
After outshooting the Wild 11-9 in the first period, Prince George saw the shots get flipped on them. Wenatchee fired 13 shots on Jordan Fairlie in both the second and third periods as they tried to shift the ice against PG.
Fairlie stood on his head for much of the back half of the game as he stopped 34 of the 35 shots fired at him.
Fairlie was named the second star of the night while teammate Makow earned the top star honours. Wild’s Owen Millward was named the game’s third star stopping 20 of 22 shots.
Prince George was able to hold on with the first period being the only one to see scoring, securing their ninth win of the season.
The Spruce Kings improve to 9-3-0-1 while the Wild remain at the bottom of the Interior Division with a record of 2-8-0-1.
Prince George’s next game will be Friday, November 4 against the Penticton Vees at the South Okanagan Events Centre. The Vees are undefeated with an unblemished record of 14-0-0-0.