The West Kelowna Warriors open up the 2016 Bauer BCHL Showcase with a rematch of the of last year’s BCHL Finals when they take on the Chilliwack Chiefs in Chilliwack tonight.
The Warriors and Chiefs battled out 6 hard fought games in the league final a season ago with West Kelowna coming away victorious with the Fred Page Cup. A total of 17 players between the two teams return from that series with 7 from the Warriors and 10 coming from the Chiefs side of things.
West Kelowna comes into tonight with a 2-1 record because of a 3-1 victory over the Vernon Vipers on Saturday night. The Warriors played their best team effort of the young season with a solid win over a team that was rolling heading into the game. Nick Rutigliano, Quin Foreman and Mitchell Barker scored for the Warriors while Jagger Williamson tallied the only Vipers marker.
Discipline will be a big key for the Warriors in tonight’s game as West Kelowna had eight penalty kills in Saturday’s game against the Vipers, which they would go on to kill off seven of those but it’s a fine line to play against when down a man, especially against an explosive team like the Chiefs.
The Warriors got a gritty effort from new goaltender Xavier Burghardt, who made 25 saves on 26 shots for his first career victory in the BCHL. The 19 year-old will be between the pipes again tonight in search of back-to-back victories.
The Chiefs enter tonight with an identical 2-1 record, winning their first two games of the season against the Langley Rivermen and Salmon Arm Silverbacks before dropping their home opener last Saturday against the Rivermen.
Chilliwack erupted for 6 goals in their season opener, and the grand re-opening of the George Preston Arena in Langley to defeat the Rivermen 6-3 and headed to Salmon Arm the next weekend to beat the ‘Backs by a 4-1 score before the Rivermen returned the favour and spoiled the Chiefs home opener as Langley won 4-1 in Prospera Centre.
The Chiefs, as mentioned, return 10 players from last season’s Mainland Division winning squad in likes of captain Jordan Kawaguchi, Jesse Lansdell, Jake Smith, Kale Kane, Linden Hora, Aaron O’Neill, Kohen Olischefski, Olivier Arseneau, Connor McCarthy and Nolan Zweep.
The Chiefs have only surrendered 8 goals in their 3 games thus far and a large part of that can be due to their veteran new comers in net as Mark Sinclair (’96) and Robert Jacobson (’97) have done a good job at keeping the puck out of their net.
Of course Chilliwack remains as a very good offensive team with highly potent offensive weapons in Jordan Kawaguchi, Kale Kane, Kohen Olischefski and others. Kawaguchi and Olischefski have six points through their first three games while Kane has scored twice in that span.
The game can be seen live on FASTHockey pay-per-view video or you can listen with live audio for free on the Warriors Internet Network with pre game starting at 7:20 pm and puck drop slated for 7:30 pm from Prospera Centre.
