The victory last night, and it was a notable one, was the $19,000 raised for breast cancer research on the Island during Pink in the Rink Night.
The loss came in the home team failing to reward, for the second night in a row, a crowd in excess of 6,000 at Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre. Those kinds of chances to impress a large hometown throng don't come around too often. But the ragged Victoria Salmon Kings dropped their fourth ECHL game in a row, and third straight to the arch-nemesis Las Vegas Wranglers, in bowing 2-1 before 6,470 fans.
After Victoria took a 1-0 lead in the first period, it was hard to recall another really good scoring chance for the home side. It is becoming evident just how much the squad missed the blue-line mobility provided by Patrick Coulombe who is out with a lower body injury, and Dylan Yeo, on an AHL call-up to the Manitoba Moose.
The Salmon Kings power play looked downright clueless in going zero-for-five after going zero-for-six the night before in a 4-2 loss to Vegas. The Salmon Kings still lead the National Conference, thanks to a three-game skid by second place Alaska, but the dressing room was a grim and deathly silent place following the game.
"The Wranglers are tough on the forecheck, and we're not clicking right now," said Salmon Kings defenceman Matt Kelly.
"It's a long season and you have your ups and downs. We're in a down phase at the moment. We just have to battle through this."
The pink tape some of the Salmon Kings players wrapped around their sticks for the game yesterday wasn't enough.The question heading into the third period was would the Salmon Kings, locked in a 1-1 contest, regret frittering away a two-minute, two-man powerplay late in the second period? The answer came when veteran Chris Ferraro scored the winning goal for Vegas at 3:48 of the third period.
The Wranglers haven't really been their old selves this season but are turning it around and have won five straight to move to 23-18-4. The Salmon Kings slipped to 29-15-4 as that 30th victory-plateau has proven slippery to attain. The clubs close out their four-game set today at 5 p.m. at the Memorial Centre.
Adam Taylor, with his second goal of the season gave Victoria the lead at 12:36 of the first with a good second effort. It's the kind of approach the Salmon Kings needed this entire series, instead of looking for those perfect passing assists that are hard to come by against this tenacious and suffocating Vegas squad.
"Maybe it's a matter of keeping it simple and banging in those greasy kinds of goals and getting a greasy kind of win that will pull us out of this," said Taylor.
The Wranglers levelled at 1-1 at 10:10 of the second period through defenceman Brandon Straub, who earlier this season earned a call-up to the Quad City Flames of the AHL.
cdheensaw@tc.canwest.com
