Tbirds make it two in a row over Red Deer

Tbirds defeat the Red Deer Rebels last night 5-2 in 4327 people in attendance at Key Arena. Seattle is now 4-1 at home... maybe they want to re-think this whole moving thing... only kidding of course.

The game had a very eventful start as Devon LeBlanc scored just 90 seconds into the game stuffing a rebound past Rebel goaltender Morgan Clark for the 1-0 lead... but Red Deer answered quickly as they scored twice, 40 seconds apart only 3 minutes into the game and Seattle found themselves down 2-1.

Calvin Pickard looked horrible early on but Sumner called for his timeout and decided to stick with the young goaltender and the move paid off. Pickard was much better the rest of the way in front of a solid defensive effort an was not beaten again.

Seattle began their comeback with a goal by Brenden Silvester, who continues to look increasingly comfortable with his expanded role.

Another youngster looking more comfortable is Jonathan Parker who scored his 3rd goal of the season to give the Tbirds a lead they would not give up in the second period. Parker has scored in two straight now and has 4 points since joining the Rai/O'Brien line.

Following the trend... 16 year old Luke Lockhart poked home a rebound past Clark to give the Tbirds a 4-2 lead short of the midway mark in the 3rd period. The goal by Lockhart was the first of his WHL career and was assisted by Colin Haas and Chance Lund who picked up his first WHL point on Lockhart's goal.

Prab Rai finished the scoring with just over a minute left by scoring into the open net and sending Tbird fans home with a free burger from Dairy Queen for the 3rd home game in a row.

Tbirds get right back at it tonight in Chilliwack as they embark on their 7 game road trip that will move through the Eastern Division.

At 6-10-2 and 14 points in 18 games are getting closer and closer to that .500 mark I've been talking about for the first half of the season.... but this Eastern road swing is certain to test them immensely and I would have to think that 3-4 (lets say 6 or 7 points) could be considered a great success. Chilliwack is really struggling, having lost 9 of their last 10, making tonight's game critical to having a successful road trip.

I have to say that I was very surprised to see Calvin Pickard in there again last night and I have to wonder to myself how long it takes Sumner to get DeSerres back to playing a majority of the games. I think Pickard has a really bright future, but I'm not convinced this team can ultimately be successful with a 16 year old goaltender playing a majority of the games... but perhaps he can prove me wrong. I would expect to see DeSerres in there tonight on the road, but at this point nothing would surprise me.

I think if the Tbirds can continue to get contributions from guys like Silvester, Parker and to a lesser extent Lockhart they have a great chance to get back to .500 sooner than later.

One last note... I didn't listen to the pregame show... I know David Richard is hurt but I don't know where Jeremy Boyer was. Does anyone know if he got hurt as well?