Team WHL Sneaks Past Russians in Victoria
Team WHL extended the Canadian Hockey League’s winning streak to five games in the 2009 SUBWAY Super Series with a narrow 2-1 victory over Team Russia Wednesday night in Victoria, BC.
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Levko Koper of the Spokane Chiefs opened the scoring one minute inside the third period to break a scoreless game and earn Player of the Game honours for his club in a game that featured top notch goaltending from both sides.
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Koper’s shot was the 30th fired by Team WHL at Russian netminder Igor Bobkov who earned Player of the Game for Team Russia with 40 saves in the game. His counterpart, Calvin Pickard of the Seattle Thunderbirds was impressive when counted on turning aside 19 shots to earn the win in goal.
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Wacey Hamilton of the Medicine Hat Tigers also provided the offence for Team WHL with a goal at 8:48 of the third period which would stand as the game-winner. Picking up an assist on the play was Victoria hometown defenceman Tyson Barrie who received a tremendous ovation from the 6,695 in attendance at the Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre crowd.
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Kirill Petrov made things interesting for Russia scoring his third goal of the series with just under a minute to play in the final frame.
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Team WHL will look to pull off the series sweep when the series wraps up Thursday night in Kelowna, BC.
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The game will be broadcast on Rogers Sportsnet with broadcast times available at www.subwaysuperseries.com and can also be seen live online through INSINC webcast by visiting http://chl.insinc.com/canadavsrussia/.
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Photo by Anne-Marie Sorvin