Pierce Diamond made 27 saves and Paul Selleck’s first-period goal stood up as the game-winner as the Cowichan Valley Capitals took a stranglehold 3-1 lead in their B.C. Hockey League playoff series against the Penticton Vees with a 3-0 victory at the Cowichan Arena on Wednesday night.
“It’s not done yet,” Cowichan head coach Mike Vandekamp cautioned. “We’re playing a really, really good team here, and we have to remain focused, keep working really hard, obviously, and again I don’t want to put the cart ahead of the horse here, there’s a lot of work still to do, but we’ve played well and so have they. The games have been really hard-fought games for sure.”
Preston Brodziak scored on a two-on-one with captain Vincent Millette in the second period and Millette added a hard-earned empty-netter in the third. Both teams went 0-for-3 on the powerplay.
“I think that’s the big thing in the playoffs is we’ve been pretty disciplined for the most part,” Vandekamp said. “Special teams stepped up tonight, for example, our penalty kill did a way better job. Our guys have just really bought in.”
Brodziak echoed his coach’s comments about committing to the game plan.
“We’re just buying in a lot by blocking shots, laying body checks every chance we can get, and trying to wear them out as much as we can,” the forward said. “We’re just getting pucks deep and working hard to get there and score some goals.”
Wednesday’s game came on the heels of a 3-2 overtime win by Cowichan on Tuesday night. Defenceman David Melaragni, who led the Caps with 38 assists and 50 points in the regular season, scored at 3:54 of the first overtime on Monday as the Caps won their first home game of the postseason after splitting the first two games in Penticton.
Duncan’s own Luc Wilson scored in the second period to make it 1-1, and Niko Esposito-Selivanov potted his third goal of the playoffs in the third period to momentarily give Cowichan a 2-1 lead.
Diamond made 30 saves on the night. The Vees went 2-for-4 on the powerplay, while the Caps were 0-for-3.
“We’ve been working really hard and it feels pretty good,” Brodziak said of his team’s 3-1 series lead. “We’re excited, but we’re trying to stay positive and stay humble because we’ve got a few more games left, and hopefully we can finish them next game on Saturday.”
The Caps know they’re the underdogs in this series and are using that to their advantage.
“Part of it is just admitting that you are who you are as a team and we’re gonna have to pull together and play as hard as we possibly can to win,” Vandekamp said. “And the most important thing is that the guys believe in themselves.”
The series will return to Penticton for game five on Saturday, and the Caps have a chance to clinch.
“That last game is gonna be hard, to go into their barn and win that fourth game,” Millette admitted. “But if we play hard the same way, we’ll get that win.”
Brodziak feels the players have to approach game five the same way they’ve gone into the first four.
“We’ve just gotta keep the pressure off,” he said. “We know we’re the underdog, kinda, so we’ve gotta stay positive. We’re just playing our game and playing hard and playing physical and it’s working for us.”
If the Vees win game five, the teams will return to Cowichan for game six on Monday at 7 p.m.
