Tokarski comes through
The best goalkeeper in the Western Hockey League wasn’t … well, wasn’t even the best in the Portland Memorial Coliseum on Sunday night.
Until it really mattered.
That’s when Dustin Tokarski showed his mettle, turning aside the last seven shots Portland put on him to spark the Spokane Chiefs’ 5-4 shootout victory before 3,330 fans.
Until then, Portland goalie Kurtis Mucha stole the show. He with a 3.89 goals-against average stopped 41 of 45 Spokane shots the first 65 minutes to give the struggling Winter Hawks (5-25-0-1) a chance to steal one from the WHL’s top-ranked Chiefs (24-5-1-2).
In a see-saw game that saw Portland go up 2-0, the Chiefs surge to a 4-2 lead, then the Winter Hawks tied it on Kevin Undershute’s power-play goal with 18 seconds to go in regulation when they had a 6-4 skater advantage after pulling Mucha, Tokarski in the end proved to be the difference.
Tokarski, who entered the game with a 1.66 average and saw it climb to 1.79, stopped Radim Valchar on a breakaway in the final 10 seconds of regulation to get it to overtime. Then he stopped all three shots the Winter Hawks took in overtime, and turned away all three Portland shooters in the shootout.
Jace Coyle, the second of three Spokane shooters, beat Mucha to win it, extending the Chiefs’ lead over idle Tri-City to six points in the U.S. Division.
Drayson Bowman scored his WHL-leading 27th goal as he, Chris Bruton and Jared Spurgeon each had a goal and an assist for Spokane. Bowman has 50 points, tied for second in league scoring. Chris Langkow also scored for the Chiefs.
Luke Walker, Chris Francis and Jacob Dietrich also scored for Portland.
Braves victorious
Andrew Christ had two third-period goals and Brandon Lassiter scored the winner with 3:34 to play as the Spokane Braves rallied for a 7-5 Kootenay International Junior Hockey League win over Kimberley at Eagles Ice-A-Rena on Sunday.
Christ, who also had two assists, scored the trying goal and iced it with an empty-netter, and goalie Cash Ulrich turned back 52 shots as the Braves (16-14-3) moved into third place in the Neil Murdoch Division, eight points behind first-place Creston. Kimberley is 12-16-4.