Vees flip the script, stun Rockets 5-3

The Kelowna Rockets looked ready to turn the corner. A strong opening period, a power play goal, and steady goaltending had them in full control after twenty minutes. But hockey games aren’t won in one period, and Saturday night inside the South Okanagan Events Centre, the Penticton Vees proved that in convincing fashion.

The expansion Vees scored five of the next six goals on home ice in a 5-3 come-from-behind win over the Rockets, their fifth victory of the season, enough to lead the BC Division to the surprise of many around the league. For Kelowna, it marked their second straight loss of the weekend following a 3-1 setback to Seattle the night before.

Assistant coach Brandon McMillan reflected on a night that began with promise and ended with frustration.

“Yeah, it was a good way to start,” McMillan said. “We’ve been really focusing on getting a good first period, and we did that tonight. We got the first goal, we scored a power play goal, which we’ve been struggling a little bit with, and it was a good way to start the game.”

It was the start Kelowna’s coaching staff had been asking for. A fast tempo, a physical tone, and a goal from Dawson Gerwing, who hadn’t looked quite himself since returning from his NHL camp with the Los Angeles Kings. But Saturday, Gerwing was back on track.

“100%. I thought he finally got back to what got him to an NHL camp,” McMillan said. “He was skating, he was physical, he wasn’t hesitant, wasn’t thinking the game, he was just playing it. We need him to play like that every night, and he can be a force in this league with how big he is.”

McMillan acknowledged that hesitation can be a silent killer in a young player’s game.

“Sometimes guys second guess themselves and you can tell the hesitation in their game,” he added. “You’ve just gotta get them to play. Do what you’re supposed to do and be in the spots you need to be in, but do it without overthinking. Just get to those spots and say, OK, this is what I’ve got to do, this is the play I’m going to make.”

Kelowna carried a 2-0 lead into the intermission. But just 54 seconds into the second period, Penticton found the back of the net and never looked back.

“We didn’t start on time in the second period,” McMillan admitted. “We started the game right, but we didn’t get going in the second and we were sitting back on our heels a little bit. They took advantage of that and were able to tie it up. Once they did, I thought our game got a little better, it woke us up a bit.”

Many of the Vees’ goals came from around the crease, the kind of goals that sting more because they’re preventable.

“We didn’t do a good job of protecting the back of our net tonight,” McMillan said. “We gave them a couple of tap-in goals which [Banini] had no chance on. Those are what I like to call freebies. We weren’t hard enough in those areas, guys going to the net, we should be harder, boxing them out, taking away sticks. Those three goals they got ended up winning the game for them.”

Kelowna led 3-2 heading into the third period, but the cushion was thin and confidence fragile.

“We talked about making the simple play, making the right play, managing the puck well,” McMillan said. “But we got on our heels a little bit. We were trying to make too many plays through the middle and it ended up killing us, that’s why they tied the game.”

When the Rockets fell behind late, head coach Derrick Martin made an aggressive move, pulling goaltender Josh Banini to tie the game.

“We had a faceoff in their end, about three minutes left, and the six guys we wanted on the ice were all fresh and ready to go,” McMillan explained. “It was an easy decision, get them out there, get them in the right position. We had a lot of pressure, a lot of good chances in that six-on-five. We just didn’t find the back of the net.”

It was the team’s third game in four nights, the first such stretch of the young season. Fatigue crept in, especially in the second period.

“We did mention that we saw some fatigue coming in our game in the second period,” McMillan said. “We just told them, take short shifts, battle through it. We only had 20 minutes left, take it shift by shift, get to the bench, get your rest. Hopefully that’s something we’ll get better with as the season goes on.”

As for what the Rockets need to fix before they return home to face Victoria on Wednesday, McMillan didn’t hesitate.

“I think it’s just puck management,” he said. “We get a little casual with our play through the neutral zone and turn pucks over. That’s something that happened in the second period tonight. We got a little casual with the puck, weren’t getting it in behind their D, and not changing over our lines the right way. That’s something we need to focus on as a group.”

From a solid start to a humbling finish, Saturday’s game was a reminder that in the WHL, momentum can shift as quickly as a puck bounces off a stick.

And as McMillan summed it up, the solution isn’t complicated, it just requires commitment.

“We’ve got to put a 60-minute game together here pretty soon.”