Chiefs v.s. Tips

[Pete76]

Well, great to see the guys come out and put some pucks in the net ... somehow our powerplay (4 of 8 tonight, and perfect on the first 3) has turned into a freight train ... midseason I was complimenting the effort of the tips (laying down blocking pucks) ... the effort just wasn't there tonigh, and they took some silly penalties (i.e. dropping the gloves to fight Bruton, and Bruton skates to the bench, and the Tips get a 2:00 penalty for taking off his gloves ... and we score) ... I'm sure that they will rebound and put up a better effort tomorrow, but I bet Irving is not in net ... Beach seemed timid, not sure if it is the facemask or what, but he is not the same player he was mid-season ... Trevor Glass is playing AWESOME for us, great on the D-line, very smart with or without the puck ... aside from our guys who put the pucks in the net, Glass has my vote for the best player on the ice!

[chiefaholic]

Well, great to see the guys come out and put some pucks in the net ... somehow our powerplay (4 of 8 tonight, and perfect on the first 3) has turned into a freight train ... midseason I was complimenting the effort of the tips (laying down blocking pucks) ... the effort just wasn't there tonigh, and they took some silly penalties (i.e. dropping the gloves to fight Bruton, and Bruton skates to the bench, and the Tips get a 2:00 penalty for taking off his gloves ... and we score) ... I'm sure that they will rebound and put up a better effort tomorrow, but I bet Irving is not in net ... Beach seemed timid, not sure if it is the facemask or what, but he is not the same player he was mid-season ... Trevor Glass is playing AWESOME for us, great on the D-line, very smart with or without the puck ... aside from our guys who put the pucks in the net, Glass has my vote for the best player on the ice!


Glass is just amazing night in and night out. I think the chiefs stole him. I agree the tips in general seemed a little timid tonight . I don't expect that to last. The Chiefs are going to have to bring IT even harder tomorrow night. GO CHIEFS!!!

[LifelongChiefsFan]

Good win tonight. Chiefs buried their PP chances early and pretty much put the game away in the first period. The momentum swung Everett's way a little in the 2nd when Everett scored right off the opening face off, but Bruton responded a couple minutes later and put the Chiefs comfortably ahead tonight.

Living in Seattle and not having the Chiefs radio feed broadcast online I have to listen to Everett's announcer and he said Irving had a night to forget, so I was curious for the Chiefs fans in attendance if the goals Irving gave up were indeed somewhat weak. I know Barrie played great and there's talk about who starts tomorrow, but I can't imagine that Leland isn't back between the pipes again. He started off poorly in the series against Spokane last year and rebounded with good outings especially in games 5 and 6. I fully expect him to be starting tomorrow.

On a positive note I'm heading to Spokane tomorrow so I'll be able to attend my first Chiefs home game of the year. I'm getting super excited about it, hopefully more people show up tomorrow, since the Cougars game should end an hour and a half or so before game time. Gotta give the crowd credit though as it sounded like they had about 8,000 on the radio instead of 4.7k. Either way it should be a blast!

[Pete76]

the crowd was pretty small, didn't even seem half full ... which honestly, is sometimes nice ... fewere people getting up and down when the game is in play ... as far as Irving, IIRC we had 4 goals on 19 shots ... but it is tough to fault a goalie for giving up PP goals, and Brutons goal (the 4th) was a laser about 3" off the ice ... not to overstate the obvious, but a win tonight would be huge ... esp. considering games 3-5 are in Everetty (thx to the womens NCAA tourney) ...

[Ams4life]

It may have been a good win but I just would remember what kind of team the tips are! They are a get down and dirty team where they will not give up! I think that they are going to keep pushing and you might see a game six or seven out of this series! Best of luck to both teams although there is a paticular team I would love to meet in the Western Conference Championship series. That is if we make it there ourselves! GO AMS GO

[Rebelchild]

For the most part I don't think that there were greasy goals last night. I was really surpised and even more grateful that Irving was way off his mark last night. Everett was their own worse enemy last night and it will stay that way until they get smart and just play hockey. On the upside - we played a LOT more hockey than Tri and Kamloops! You should see their game sheet! LOL. Third period they went to a fight Boogaard'd and there was NO hockey game in sight!

I don't think that this series is going to be a cakewalk. If Everett starts playing smart hockey and Irving gets his game on we will see some really good hockey in the days to come and I would like to see us go to Everett with two wins on the board. Just my own personal little prayer vci22 to whoever is playing hockey god this weekend!

[HomerSimpson]

According to the comments from Becanic, Irving will see the net again tonight.

Great goaltenders always come back strong...

[LifelongChiefsFan]

Just felt like throwing my thoughts out from game 2

Wow the Chiefs are good. That's the best game I've seen a Spokane Chiefs team play in years. From beginning to end they played a physical well rounded game and they gave up nothing to Everett. The Tips played a decent game, imo, but Spokane was almost perfect, it was pretty incredible. I know Everett isn't as good as they have been in the past, especially last season, but the Tips won 40 games this year, they're no slouch of a team. Still Spokane dominated and it was great to see. Some notes from the game:

Crowley for Everett is an extremely solid Dman. There was one play where Kelner had a pretty good head of steam heading straight for a stationary Crowley and Kelner hit him good and hit the deck while Crowley barely flinched. Great player, imo

Rutherford has a sweet toe drag move. I've never seen him do that before but he used it twice and completely fooled the Everett defender both times, both plays nearly resulting in goals, with only 2 great saves by Irving keeping the puck out.

I was extremely dissapointed with the officiating in this game. Even the first penalty affected the game as Spokane's first goal came on the power play, and getting the first goal against Everett is huge. The penalties the refs called were laughable considering the blatant penalties let go both way. Both teams had too many men on the ice a couple times which was never called. All in all the quantity of penalties was about correct (sans the too many men non calls) but the plays they called the penalties on were completely wrong in most cases.

Despite having poor numbers so far, Irving has played exceptionally well (at least he did in game 2). He made some tremendous saves to keep the Tips in the game. The only mistake he made was the horrible rebound on Donaghy's shot which went straight to Compton for a tap in rebound at the top of the crease. Other than that Irving made some great saves. He has a wicked glove hand.

I could write more but I think I've taken up enough space. But through 2 games, I feel confident in saying Spokane is easily the better team. That doesn't mean this series is over though, not by a long shot. Everett is extremely tough at home and Spokane has never won a playoff game in the Comcast Arena. Still if Spokane brings the physical play and intensity that they had in game 2 they are going to be extremely tough to beat. I fully expect Everett to come out flying on Wednesday. It should be an exciting game!

[chiefaholic]

Lifelongchiefsfan , Are you going to the games in Everett? If so , Have fun , and a recap would be much appreciated.

[LifelongChiefsFan]

Lifelongchiefsfan , Are you going to the games in Everett? If so , Have fun , and a recap would be much appreciated.


I'll still be in Spokane for tomorrow's game, but I should be back in Seattle by Friday afternoon. If that is the case I'll be going to both games in Everett (assuming both need to be played). Posting recaps for everyone will be no problem. :)

[Pete76]

next .........................

[Ams4life]

So it looks like we will be playing Kelowna or Seattle, personally I hope its Kelowna cause Seattle gives us one heck of a time. Anyways who will you guys be playing? Is it Vancouver? That would/will be a heck of a series!

[dondo]

Although its almost a fait accompli (done deal for the 'mericans in the audience), the Chiefs still have to win one more game and sometimes that game is the hardest one to win.

The Tips have never really been a playoff team and their dominance in the past during the regular season has never really translated to the second season. That said any team in this conference should win on a given night (except maybe Portland this year- the poor bastids), so don't count out the Tips just yet.

Should the Chiefs finish the sweep, or get through in 5, 6 or 7 games they will face the Vancouver Giants. Now as far as I know the second round is based on conference standings and regular season points, so the Giants would start on the road in Spoke should the Chiefs win the series.

[chiefaholic]

So it looks like we will be playing Kelowna or Seattle, personally I hope its Kelowna cause Seattle gives us one heck of a time. Anyways who will you guys be playing? Is it Vancouver? That would/will be a heck of a series!


Yes , If/when the Chiefs get past Everett , They will be facing Vancouver. The Chiefs would have Home ice advantage. If it happens it should be a barn burner of a series. :thumb: GO CHIEFS!!!

[HomerSimpson]

Yes , If/when the Chiefs get past Everett , They will be facing Vancouver. The Chiefs would have Home ice advantage. If it happens it should be a barn burner of a series. :thumb: GO CHIEFS!!!

Wrong.

Unless they reformat after the first round, the Giants are the #2 seed and the Chiefs are the #3 seed, thus meaning Vancouver gets home ice, in spite of the fact that the Chiefs had more points, Vancouver won the BC division and gets the higher spot.

[chiefaholic]

Wrong.

Unless they reformat after the first round, the Giants are the #2 seed and the Chiefs are the #3 seed, thus meaning Vancouver gets home ice, in spite of the fact that the Chiefs had more points, Vancouver won the BC division and gets the higher spot.


Vancouver only gets the higher seed for the 1st round. Then the teams are ranked by points. Which would make the Chiefs the #2 seed for the rest of the playoffs. The only team that could have home ice over spokane after the 1st round is Tri . It was in a recent news letter sent out by the WHL to help clear up any confusion. So yes , They do reformat after round 1. Or at least thats what I have read anyway.

[LifelongChiefsFan]

Vancouver only gets the higher seed for the 1st round. Then the teams are ranked by points. Which would make the Chiefs the #2 seed for the rest of the playoffs. The only team that could have home ice over spokane after the 1st round is Tri . It was in a recent news letter sent out by the WHL to help clear up any confusion. So yes , They do reformat after round 1. Or at least thats what I have read anyway.

Yes this is correct. The division winners are seeded first and second for the first round only. Afterwards it is based on total points, so Spokane would have home ice advantage against the Giants. Though this begs the question, why even seed division winners this way if it only applies to one round?

[LinkGaetzFan]

It has to do with rewarding the team who wins the division, creating motivation to do so. However, they also realize divisions aren't ever ideally matched up and they don't want to penalize the team who finished with more points, just like this very instance with the Chiefs and Vancouver. The odds are highly unlikely that a division winner will play a team (7th seed) that has more regular season points in the first round.

[HomerSimpson]

Sorry if I created any confusion then...I read the WHL letter, but paid no mind to it at all. I just went with the old rules that I was more familiar with.

Thanks for clearing it up, guys.

Does anyone have a dustpan, by the way? :skeptical

[LifelongChiefsFan]

Here’s my thoughts on tonight’s game:

I completely disagree with Becanic’s decision to play Barrie in this game. I don’t see it. Irving, while not on his best, did not play badly in this series. I really don’t understand this move at all. Irving is one of your leaders and you bench him in what could possibly be his last game as a Silvertip. That’s gotta leave a sour taste in Irving’s mouth. I would not be surprised at all if Becanic is not the head coach of the tips next season. The guy seems like a decent assistant, but I'm not convinced he's head coach material.

Blackwater’s goal was a huge defensive breakdown by the Tips. There was no reason for him to have as much time and space as he had. I’m not quite sure what happened there, but the Everett defenders gave Barrie no help on that play at all.

Defensively Glass and Falk were nearly perfect on the night. Both those guys had awesome games. To be fair to everyone, the entire D corps played very well, but those 2 guys in particular were outstanding.

The Chiefs controlled the 2nd period, but just couldn’t quite connect on anything. Despite what I said earlier about playing Irving, Barrie played very well tonight. How does Everett come up with all these awesome goaltenders? Even if Irving is not back next year, I don’t think Everett is going to be hurting all that much on the back end.

Midway through the 3rd period was the first time in the series where it looked like Everett truly wanted to play hockey. The started really pressuring the Chiefs, had a very good forecheck and were pretty relentless in their effort to tie up the game. If Everett had played like this every game, there series outcome could have been very different. They definitely would not have swept Everett, who has a ton of talent.

The high sticking penalty on Bowman and the boarding call on Koper were travesties. I cannot describe it any better than that. Bowman’s call came when he followed through on shooting the puck down the ice and he happened to clip an Everett player (I think it was Hamill but I can’t remember for sure) in the face. His stick was not out of control and despite any damage he does to another player’s face, by rule this is NOT a penalty. I can’t imagine that all 4 referees missed the fact that Bowman was shooting on the play leading me to believe that these refs don’t even know the entire rulebook. The Koper boarding call was just plain sad. Nothing dirty about it, I don’t really know what else to say. Write down some reasons that refs are supposed to call boarding, put them all in a hat, shake it up and pull one out and you have your “reason” that penalty was called. Don’t get me wrong, a couple of the calls on Everett were iffy as well, but these 2 were the worst calls of the night.

After the Chiefs killed the 5-3, the tide seemed to turn. At one point during the OT, Everett was out shooting Spokane 6-0 (I’m not 100% sure on this but Everett had at least the first 5 shots of the period) and the totals for OT ended 7-4 according to the score sheet, so Spokane had the majority of the scoring chances during the second half of the 12 overtime minutes that were played. Spurgeon (I'm almost 100% certain it was Bowman who made the pass, but everything I've read says Spurgeon even though I know Glass and Falk were on the ice at the time...) made a perfect pass to Wahl to end it, all he had to do was guide the puck in a wide open net and that was the series.

Overall it was a fun trip up to Everett. The arena is pretty nice (although the concourse could be a tad larger :) ) but it was a pleasant experience. I didn’t have any problems with the fans, you heard an occasional “Spokane sucks” etc, but that’s to be expected and not hard to deal with. Overall the fans were courteous and respectful. The only complaint I have about the arena is that damn horn. They blow that thing all the time. It’s called a GOAL horn, blow it 2x max after a goal and it’s good. Nothing major, but I found that pretty annoying. I always have to complain about something every time I visit an arena for the first time. :spineyes:

But anyway after all that I’m glad the Chiefs came out on top; it was an exciting game that could have gone either way, but it’s been 5 years since I’ve been able to see my team win a playoff round so I’m very happy about that. It doesn’t get any easier playing the defending Memorial Cup champs but I am definitely looking forward to it. And to the Everett fans, I must say that was a pretty impressive display of gratitude to your team at the end of the game. It was very loud there at the end and that was cool to see. I know it is disappointing when your team loses, so way to support your team and good luck next season!

[PLAYER]

I was glad to see Barrie played tonight. He has more fire in his belly ... and as for Becanic, he is a good assistant. I agree with you there. Everett has a lot of talent but bad team chemistry and I think that comes from the coaching. Ya, I don't think Becanic should be there next year but rumor has it he gets two years to prove his worth. Spokane was going to win the series anyway so I am glad Everett came out to play tonight. No dishonor in this game, Everett came out to win. it is the coaching to blame for this lackluster team.... good job boys in spite of the coaching. clrkthj

[Ams4life]

I could tell all year that the coaching wasn't that great becasue if you watched some of the line match-ups he would put out there and the fore check that he played against us wasn't the best for when you are playing a fast team! I don't know it just seemed to me that a lot of his calls were like he was un-certain what to do next. I guess we will see next year how it goes. Good Luck

[Rooselk]

Good luck to the Chiefs - I hope they go all the way. I might be a Tips fan, but I was also born and raised in Spokane. With the Tips out of the race, I'd like nothing more than to see the Chiefs win the WHL championship.