The Terrace River Kings made their way to Prince Rupert on November 21 for a game against the Rampage, a game that was played in front of a packed house at the Jim Ciccone Civic Centre arena.

After killing a penalty of their own, the Rampage opened the scoring on the powerplay as Mino Verrde took a cross-ice pass from Chris Brlecic that beat netminder Patrick Leal with 14:50 to play. Rob Millar added to the Rampage lead as he went in alone and beat Leal glove-side with 3:27 to play, and that would be all of the scoring in the first frame as Rupert took a 2-0 lead into the locker room.

The Rampage struck first in the second as well, as Jonathan Hunt picked up a rebound and slid the puck past a downed Leal after some fancy stickwork to give Rupert a commanding 3-0 lead. But Terrace began to find its game midway through the period and, with a five-on-3 advantage, Calen Findlay’s blast from the circle beat netminder Keith Movold to open the scoring for the River Kings with 8:29 to play, and just over five minutes later Steve Cullis stuffed the puck into the net from the side of the crease to pull Terrace within one. The second period ended with a much closer 3-2 score, ensuring an exciting finish to the game.

But that would be as close as the River Kings would get. Travis Helland of the Rampage unleashed a blast from the blue line through traffic that found its way to the back of the net with 12:44 to play to give the Rampage a 4-2 lead, and the rest of the game saw both goaltenders stand their ground as the teams continued the back and forth play. When the final buzzer sounded it was a 4-2 win for Prince Rupert.

“We knew it was going to be a tough game. We’ve been playing since the third week of September and the guys are tired and some of the guys are out injured…The strategy going in was to go out and play 60 minutes and take the body one more time, and then we have our bye weekend coming up,” said coach Frank Pyde, noting that injured players like Chris Woodrow and Dan Wright could be back in two to three weeks while captain Colt Stava will probably be gone for several more weeks with a knee injury that resulted from a knee-on-knee hit in the Sunday game against Burns Lake.

“We have enough depth on our bench that we don’t have to rush people back.”

The win, coupled with a loss by the Smithers Steelheads in Kitimat on Saturday night, puts the Rampage in second place in the western conference with a total of 13 points. Terrace, meanwhile, sits at the bottom of the conference with five points. Next up for the Rampage will be a trip to Kitimat to face the league-leading Ice Demons on December 5.

“The focus for the rest of the season will be to keep up the energy and the momentum we have from our wins, and to just do what has been working, because the boys know what has been working,” said Pyde.

A special treat will be in store for Rampage fans during the final home game against Smithers on December 19 as Triple Bypass returns to play live during the game.