New Centennial plays hero as Cents Strangle the Vipers

Welcome to Merritt Carter Shinkaruk!

In his first game with the red, white and black, former Powell River King Carter Shinkaruk broke a scoreless deadlock in the 2nd period and spurred the Centennials to a 3-0 shutout victory over the struggling Vernon Vipers. The win was Merritt's 4th straight, and the loss was Vernon's 4th straight as well. With Chilliwack beating Prince George tonight, the Cents cushion for 2nd is now up to 8 points on Prince George (though the Spruce Kings have 1 game in hand) and 9 points on Chilliwack still (though the Chiefs have 3 games in hand). The cushion on the 5th place Vipers is now up to 14 points, and even though Vernon has 2 games in hand, you have to think it's no longer a question of "if" the Centennials get into the playoffs, but simply "can they hold their 2nd seed through the remaining 3rd of the season"....... to be determined.

-unlike Saturday in Vernon, the Cents came out ready from the opening face-off tonight, and simply looked more determined throughout the night. They won more battles, blocked more shots and went the extra mile together as a team to come up with their best game since the Christmas break

-the 1st period was scoreless but far from boring... there was lots of up and down play both ways, several momentum swings, but both goalies (Lino Chimienti and Kirby Halcrow) stood tall and looked very sharp to keep the game scoreless

-2nd period was much the same as the first... again evenly played, and again the goalies continued to steal the spotlight in yet another low-scoring affair between these two rivals. But when the Centennials got their 3rd crack at the power play, they broke through and didn't look back. After a clean but devastating hit by Silvan Harper on Max Mowat, Turner Lawson came and cheap-shotted Harper in the neutral zone to get 2 minutes for charging (could have and probably should have been more). Brandon Bruce won the ensuing face-off back to Billy Marshall, Marshall threw the puck on net, and Shinkaruk buried the rebound through the legs of Halcrow to break the ice and give the Cents the 1-0 lead they would never relinquish.

-In the 3rd period, for whatever reason, the Vipers did not show much life... for much of the game, they were merely playing "prevent" defense, and as soon as they got control of it in their own zone, they flipped it to center to make sure they wouldn't get burned... this was especially evident in the 3rd, as the Cents came at the Vipers in waves, and outshot them 14-2. Instead of pushing back to tie the game, the Vipers were merely trying to prevent further damage. But AP call-up Eric Chore (from the North Okanagan Knights of the KIJHL) made a bad pass up the middle out of his own zone that was picked off by Evan Stack, and he broke in with speed, got a soft shot off, but Halcrow gave up a juicy rebound, and the Merritt captain buried it on the backhand to give Merritt the 2nd goal and the all-important insurance marker.
The Vipers simply got too dejected from this goal and didn't have much mojo left, allowing the Centennials to cruise to victory. But not before another power play marker from the captain... after struggling in the first 90 seconds of their 4th power play, the Cents had a dominant final 30 seconds, hemming the Vipers in their own zone... Brears fed Soquila in the right circle for a one-timer, and with 2 seconds left in the power play, Evan Stack buried the rebound for his 2nd of the game and team-leading 17th goal of the season to cap off the scoring at 3-0 (ironic how much Evan struggled to score in the first half of last season, even one goal, and Chad Brears managed just 4 all of last year... now they are the team leaders in goal scoring)

-Lino Chimienti had a very good, very confident game for Merritt between the pipes. He didn't have to "huge" but he was very solid. Although not really tested in the 3rd period, he earned his stripes in the 1st and 2nd. It was a relatively routine night for the Quebec native, but he made a lot of underrated saves on quick shots and shots through traffic, and most importantly, he looked calm and composed throughout the night with good rebound control and not a lot of scrambling needed. It was Lino's 3rd shutout of the season, and after an up and down season, he has now gotten his GAA below 3, slightly better than Tyler at 2.86 (Tyler's is 2.87), and his save percentage above .900 at .903 (slightly below Tyler's .907). It is uncanny how these two netminders have such similar stats. This was Lino's 4th straight start and 5th straight appearance (he has now played 4 more games than Tyler), but you have to expect Tyler will get back in at some point this weekend. Luke Pierce might decide to go with the hot hand in Lino vs Chilliwack on Saturday, but one way or the other, Tyler Steel will have to get a game in this weekend, whether it's Saturday vs Chilliwack or Sunday vs Langley.

-defensively, Merritt had another remarkable game... they hustled on the backcheck, sacrificed their body, broke up plays constantly, and any time there was a loose puck on top of Lino's crease, the Cents were on it first and able to prevent any damage. Billy Marshall led the way as usual by winning almost every single battle, whether it was 1 on 1, 1 on 2 or 1 on 3... he simply wanted the puck more, and that was the case for most Centennials all night long

-Merritt was also very strong in the faceoff circle, led (from my perspective) by Brent Fletcher, who seems to be a perfect fit on the 4th line with Schaefer and Lamont. This trio had another effective, dangerous game and numerous times came close to scoring.

-top to bottom, all across the board, I doubt the Centennials coaching staff has much to complain about from this game... it was a team effort through all 4 lines, 3 defensive pairings and the goaltender, and they have now outscored Vernon 8-1 over the course of the last 3 head-to-head meetings.

-special teams was another big factor, as the Cents found some life on the power play... after going 1 for their last 13, they capitalized on 2 in a row before the secondary guys got a chance on the final 5th power play in this game. And as for the penalty kill, it was aggressive, persuasive, and sometimes more dangerous than Vernon's power play, as the Cents went a perfect 5 for 5, including a late kill in the final 2 minutes of the game. All the intangibles were there for this one.

Here are the audio highlights from a very exciting, entertaining game from the Nicola Valley Memorial Arena:

Vernon @ Merritt Jan 13 Highlights by agreb21