Tonight’s Preview: The Rockets and Americans are meeting for the third time this season. The Rockets are 0-1-1-0 against the Americans, having been out-scored just 7-4 in the seasonal series. The Am’s have made two visits to Kelowna this season recorded a 3-1 and 4-3 overtime victory. After tonight’s game the Rockets conclude the seasonal series with a road date March 11th. The Rockets open a weekend playing three games in three nights for the very first time this season. Following tonight’s game the Rockets are home tomorrow night against Kamloops before traveling to Vancouver for a Sunday affair. The Rockets have points in three straight games (2-0-1-0) and four of their last 6 games (2-3-2-0).
Tonight the hockey club opens up a portion of their schedule playing four of their next 5 games on the road.
A Night @ Bernie’s: Rockets forward Justin Bernhardt had a 3 point night in Wednesday’s 4-0 win over Portland. Bernhardt’s 3 point effort was the fourth time he’s accomplished the feat this season. The 18 year old had 3 points against Swift Current, Calgary and Lethbridge as a member of the Regina Pats earlier this season. In fact Bernhardt had 4 points (1+3=4) in that game against the Hurricanes on October 21st. Overall ‘Bernie’ has 16 multiple point games in his WHL career.
It’s Not all Bad: While the Rockets may have lost starting goaltending Kristofer Westblom for the remainder of the season with a left knee injury, a doctor appointment Wednesday showed no damage to his ACL. That essentially means he won’t require surgery on a knee that suffered an MCL tear. Westblom will remain on crutches for another 2 weeks before undergoing rehab. Westblom says he could be back in 8 weeks, but the team is taking a more cautious approach for a return date in about 12 weeks.
Number Crunching: The Rockets have recorded back to back shutouts over Vancouver and Portland. The Rockets have not allowed a goal since Cody Franson scored the game winner at the 2:07 mark of overtime in the Giants 4-3 win last Friday…When was the last time the Rockets recorded back to back shutouts? It wasn’t that long ago. The Rockets registered shutout wins January 28/06 in a 6-0 win over Kootenay last season before shutting out Everett 2-0 Feb 1st/06…The Rockets are 69 and 49 all time in the WHL playoffs since moving to Kelowna. They have beaten the Spokane Chiefs and Kootenay Ice the most times in post season play with 13 victories. Oddly enough the Rockets have also lost the most times to the Chiefs in the playoffs with 10 setbacks…The Rockets have 13 players on their roster drafted in the WHL bantam draft, including five from 2005 and five from the 2004 draft…In the Rockets 14 wins this season the teams power play is 17.1% or 18 for 105…The Rockets have called up 16 year old Daniel Salamandyk to backup Torrie Jung. Salamandyk is playing this season with the Okanagan midget Rockets…The Rockets have just one win in their last 11 road games (1-8-2-0)…The Rockets are 10-13-2-0 in 25 games against BC division opponents this season…The Rockets have been involved in 20 – one goal games this season. In those games the Rockets are 7-5-5-3…The Rockets have been held to a single goal 14 times this season, 7 times at home, 7 times on the road.
Time Ticking Down: With 18 games left in the regular season the Rockets have 9 games at home and 9 games on opposition ice. The Rockets have 11 games left against BC division opponents, 5 games against US division clubs and one against Central division foes.
Who’s Hot – Who’s Not: Chris Ray has just one point (1G) in his last 11 games. Luke Schenn has just 2 assists in his last 13 games. Justin Bernhardt has 1+5=6 in his last 5 games, and snapped a 6 game goal scoring drought Wednesday. Myles MacRae has points in 8 of his last 15 games (5+4=9). Cody Almond has just one goal in his last 20 and has gone 17 games without a goal.
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