A pair of home-ice wins have put the Salmon Arm Silverbacks 3-1 versus the West Kelowna Warriors in Round 2 of the playoffs.
Following a 6-1 win and a 5-4 loss at Royal LePage Place, the ‘Backs were back at Shaw Centre on Tuesday, April 23 to resume their playoff series versus the Warriors. Salmon Arm was first on the board with a goal at the halfway mark delivered by Jonah Aegerter, assisted by JJ Monteiro and Reid Varkonyi. The frame ended with a single-handed goal from teammate Cole Cooksey.
With less than two minutes left in the second period, West Kelowna’s Jack Pridham potted a penalty conversion which, despite a strong offensive by the Warriors, would be the only thing to get past Salmon Arm netminder Eli Pulver who kept 42 shots from reaching the back of the net.
The game concluded with the ‘Backs on the winning side of a 2-1 tally.
Game 4 on Wednesday, April 24 wound up being a shutout, with the Silverbacks winning 3-0.
The three goals scored in the first frame by Salmon Arm’s Cooksey (assisted by Maddux Martin and Marcus Broberg), Monteiro (Aegerter) and Patrick Raftery (Nathan Mackie, Aegerter) may have been overshadowed by the preponderance of penalties racked up throughout the evening, which concluded in a last-minute skirmish that resulted in numerous misconduct calls including 10-minute game misconducts and 5 minutes for fighting for West Kelowna’s Kaiden Schaupmeyer and Salmon Arm’s Ryan DeAngelis.
Once more Pulver was solid in net, stopping 27 shots.
The Silverbacks will be looking to bring Round 2 to an end when the series picks up again at Royal LePage Place on Friday, April 26. If needed, Game 6 will be at Shaw Centre on April 27.
Read more: Salmon Arm Silverbacks fall in overtime to West Kelowna Warriors
Read more: Salmon Arm Silverbacks top West Kelowna 6-1 in series opener