Rockets 2 - Cougars 1

Friday night in Prince George, the Cougars fell 2-1 to the Kelowna Rockets. Shane McColgan broke a 1-1 tie with his 14th of the season mid-way through the third period to give Kelowna the win. The Cougars put forth a strong 60-minute effort, but dropped their third one-goal game this season to Kelowna.

The first period resulted in no goals for either squad, but the Cougars certainly had lots of jump. The Cougars outshot Kelowna 11-7 and had some quality chances on Adam Brown that they simply could not convert on. Devon Fordyce was strong at the other end stopping all seven shots he faced in the opening stanza.

Early in the second period Kelowna caught a break when Cody Chikie went wide on the defense and put a shot on goal that hand-cuffed Devon Fordyce. For Chikie it was his 13th of the season and the Rockets led 1-0.

Prince George kept coming though, and would have tied it if not for two shots that went off the goal-post. The home team proved through 40 minutes that they weren’t going to go down easy, and early in the third period they found some offensive life.

Dean Clark put Greg Fraser, Troy Bourke and Spencer Asuchak together for the third period, and the trio of veteran forwards did their part to even the score. Linden Springer’s point-shot was stopped but Spencer Asuchak made no mistake on the rebound for his team-leading 14th goal of the season, and the Cougars were tied 1-1.

After some back-and-forth play the Kelowna Rockets took the game’s final lead when Damon Severson found Shane McColgan on a back-door pass. McColgan made no mistake for his 14th of the season – Which ultimately sealed the deal for the Cougars. The Cats came close a few more times in the third, but Rockets netminder Adam Brown stood his ground to keep the game at 2-1.

Special-teams hurt the Cougars as well who were zero-for-five on their power plays while Kelowna went zero-for-one at the other end. Kelowna outshot Prince George 29-27.

Kelowna improved their record to 23-23-2-4 on the season while the Cougars fall to 16-33-0-2. Luckily the Cougars didn’t lose any ground on eighth placed Seattle who dropped 4-1 score to the Tri City Americans on Friday.

The Cougars and Rockets will meet again on Saturday night from CN Centre.