By Fraser Rodgers
The Penticton Vees look to end home ice dominance in their series with West Kelowna, tonight in Game Four of their Interior Division Final.
The Warriors took Game Three 2-1 and in the process the home team in the series improved to 3-0.
Penticton leads the best-of-seven series 2-1 and have a chance to go up 3-1 with a win tonight.
Nic Jones scored the only Vees goal Monday night, notching a power-play marker 12-minutes into the first period; his sixth of the playoffs and first of the series. After being held pointless in the first two games of the series, Liam Blackburn and Jonathan Desbiens scored both of the Warriors’ goals and combine for three points in the win.
Zach Driscoll suffered his first loss of these playoffs Monday, stopping 19 of 21 shots. His counterpart, Matt Greenfield, secured his fifth win making 22-saves and picked up just his second win against the Vees this season.
Penticton is in the exact same boat as they were in Game Four against the Vernon Vipers one round ago. Penticton was coming off a 2-1 loss in Game Three a night earlier and ended up blowing out the Snakes 6-2 in Game Four, highlighted by two short-handed goals from Nic Jones; the Vees went on to win that series in five.
Good news is the fact the Vees have yet to lose back-to-back games all seasons. Combing the regular season and playoffs they’re 8-0 coming off a loss and have outscored the opposition 41-14 in those eight games; they’ve scored five or more goals in five of the eight.
Zach Driscoll will start in goal and is 5-1 in the playoffs with a 1.49 goals-against average and a very sharp .934 save percentage. Greenfield will get the call once again for the Tribe and he’s 5-4 while owning a 2.59 goals-against average and sports a .923 save percentage.
penticton dressed 11 forwards and seven defencemen last night but it’s not known at press time if they’ll make any adjustments to their line-up.
Listen to the game on EZ Rock AM 800 or watch online, at www.fasthockey.com starting at 6:40 pm PST, starting with the pre-game show.