The Vernon Hockey League playoff championship series is going to a third and final game tonight (6:15) at the Wesbild Centre.
The fifth-place Godard Excavating Predators evened the best-of-three final with a 3-1 win over the first-place R.E. Postill & Sons Orphans Thursday night at Priest Valley Arena.
Trevor Abel gave the 18-10-0-2 Predators a 1-0 lead on a powerplay goal with 1:51 left in the opening period, assists going to Luc Blinkhorn and Jordan Nixon. Murray Ford was in the box for slashing.
The Orphans (20-7-0-3) evened things up at 19:06 of the second period with Leath Gare getting his fourth of the series, from Bryce Kakoske.
Former Creston Valley Thunder Cats’ d-man Kenny Johnstone made it 2-1 Preds on a powerplay with 11:39 left in the final period. Grand Forks Border Bruins’ grad Danny Stein drew the assist. The Preds got the man advantage when the Orphans were called for too many men on the ice.
Luc Blinkhorn added insurance with 3:05 to play, from Abel.
The Predators outshot the Orphans 30-25 with Danny Robert taking the win and Jason Silzer earning the loss.
Finals in the 36-team Checkers Rec Hockey Tournament go this afternoon, starting with the men’s 40 Division 2 title-game at 2 p.m. (Civic Arena).
In other 2 p.m. finals, the men’s 35 game goes at the Wesbild and the women’s Division 1 tilt is at Priest Valley.
At 3:30, the women’s Division 2 final goes at PV, the men’s 40 Division 1 game is at Civic and the men’s 40 Division 3 contest is at Wesbild.
