The Smoke Esters battled hard in Wednesday night in Penticton but couldn’t recover from some bad puck luck, falling 4-2 to the Vees
The two sides went back and forth in the first period they found themselves locked at zeros after 20mins. The Smokies had their chances as Ozar had a partial break out of the penalty box but was stopped by Vees netminder Yaniv Perets. Logan Terness who got his 5th straight start came up with a few big saves in the first as well.
The Vees would open the scoring however as David Silye would throw the puck at the net from behind the goal line and hit Kent Johnson who was collapsing to his net. Things got interesting in the second as the Smoke Eaters had to kill a four minute tripping penalty to Tyler Ghirardosi. Things got worse just 30s into the kill as Powell Connor was called for another tripping penalty, which put the Smoke Eaters down 2 men for a full two minutes. The Smokies killed the penalty off but would concede again after another bad bounce as the shot from Jay O’Briens hit Alex DiPaolo in the mid section to send the Vees to the break up 2-0.
The Smoke Eaters battled back and made it interesting as Chase Dafoe would get his second of the year, as a scramble in front was shoveled in for a power play marker to make it 2-1. The Vees though, would capitalize just 47s later on a short handed goal. Then a 1:30 later Owen Ozar got back in the goal column, as Johnson threw one into the slot for Ozar to once again bring it within one. The Vees would close the game off with an empty netter from Jay O’Brien in the final 30s.
The Smoke Eaters will regroup and reset to take on the West Kelowna Warriors Friday night at Royal LePage Place. The Warriors are also coming off a loss on Wednesday night as they were shut out 6-0 by Wenatchee
