Cougars comeback but fall to Blazers in a shootout

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Feeding off of that, Kamloops struck again with the man advantage. Matthew Seminoff registered his 15th goal of the season.

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Trailing 2-1, the Cougars were able to get on the board when Caden Brown broke up a pass near centre ice and sent Carlin Dezainde in all alone. The recent pickup for the Cougars made no mistake putting it in past Dylan Garand for both his first as a member of the Cougars and first this season.

The first period wrapped up with Kamloops holding a 2-1 lead and shots relatively close with the slight edge going to the Blazers 10-9.

Into the second period, Daylan Kuefler was quick to reestablish the Blazers two-goal lead. It took 1:45 into the period for the Kamloops’ forward to put the puck in past Tyler Brennan, giving the Blazers a 3-1 lead.

Nearing eight minutes remaining in the period, the Cougars tested Garand’s lateral movement by getting the puck crossing through the slot before Koehn Ziemmer struck with his 10th of the season, biting into the Blazers lead. PG’s new top defensive pairing of Ethan Samson and Jonas Brøndberg were credited with assists on the play. Friday marked Brøndberg’s first game with the Cougars since being acquired earlier in the week from the Portland Winterhawks.

In the final minute of the period, the Cougars nearly found their equalizer but Garand got his paddle out on what looked to be a wide-open chance for Fischer O’Brien, keeping the score at 3-2.

After 40 minutes, Kamloops still held the lead both on the scoreboard and in the shots department. The Blazers put 23 shots on Brennan after the first two periods while Garand faced 21 shots from PG.

Garand, in his first game back with Kamloops since the remainder of the World Juniors were cancelled, showcased exactly why he was backstopping Team Canada. The Cougars picked up the shooting output but the Victoria product had his glove ready for much of the night.

That was until Koehn Ziemmer carried the puck out of his own end after Kamloops controlled the puck for several minutes, getting the edge past the defence and finding an open Riley Heidt crashing down the slot. Heidt’s 9th of the season knotted things up with just over three minutes to go.

Time would expire on regulation with the score still knotted up at 3-3, leading to overtime between the two clubs.

What started off as 3-on-3, turned into 4-on-3 in favour of Kamloops after Fischer O’Brien was called for interference as Craig Armstrong looked to progress the puck in past the blueline. But the Cougars kept their sticks on the ice and killed off the penalty to keep going.

With neither team able to find a go-ahead goal in the extra frame, the game went off to a shootout.

In the shootout, the Blazers scored on both of their first two attempts while Dylan Garand turned away both Koehn Ziemmer and Riley Heidt on their attempts, resulting in a 4-3 shootout victory for Kamloops.

The two teams will now head down to Kamloops for a tilt Saturday night at the Sandman Centre at 7:00 p.m. to ring in the New Year.