With apologies to William Blake, these Tigers are burning bright in the rinks of the night.
The Medicine Hat Tigers (8-1), who have outscored their opponents 26-5 over the last four games, defeated the visiting Victoria Royals 8-2 Saturday in a Western Hockey League game.
The loss snapped a two-game winning streak and an unbeaten roll of three games for Victoria (3-5-1).
It was a 3-2 contest in the second period before the Tigers buried the Royals under the weight of five unanswered goals.
Jack Walker, who has six points in his last four games, and Austin Carroll, who has six goals and 10 points in seven games since being sent back from the NHL’s Calgary Flames, led Victoria with a goal and assist each. Chad Butcher led the balanced Medicine Hat offence with two goals.
Coleman Vollrath made 31 saves in goal for the Royals while Marek Langhamer stopped 20 shots for Medicine Hat.
It was a rugged affair with penalties aplenty.
“They [Tigers] are a good team and they have skill and they play with pace,” said Royals head coach Dave Lowry.
“But they go down pretty easy. We took the bait. Our guys responded, and they backed off. But I’m proud of how our older guys looked after our younger guys.”
The Tigers were able to take advantage of the penalty imbalance, scoring four power plays on their 11 chances. The Royals had their opportunities, too, but went 0-7 on the power play.
It was the second outing of Victoria’s six-game road trip in nine days through the Central Division of the Eastern Conference after Friday’s 3-2 rally victory over the Hitmen in Calgary.
The Royals are in Red Deer on Tuesday to face the Rebels before a game Wednesday in Edmonton against the defending Memorial Cup champion Oil Kings.
