Rockets game notes vs. Blazers

Tonight’s Preview: The Kelowna Rockets close out a three game home stand tonight against the visiting Kamloops Blazers. This is the 8^th and final meeting of the season between the two teams. This is the third meeting in the last week. Last Friday the Rockets suffered a 3-2 loss before falling 3-2 a night later at Prospera Place. The Rockets are 5-2-0-0 in the seven games against the Blazers and are 16-5-0-0 in their last 21 home games against their closest rival. Of the seven games this season, six have been decided by a goal. The only lopsided score was a 7-2 Rockets win in Kamloops on September 26^th. Tyson Baillie leads the Rockets in the seasonal series with 6+6=12. Kole Lind has 5+3=8 while Tomas Soustal has 6+1=7 in the seven games. Michael Herringer is 1-2-0-0 against the Blazers with a goals against average of 2.82 and a save percentage of .912.

Rockets Recap: The Rockets enter the game three points back of the Victoria Royals for first place in the WHL. The Rockets do have one game in hand on the Royals. The Rockets are coming off a 3-2 shootout win Wednesday night over the visiting Prince George Cougars. After skating to a scoreless tie through two periods, Tyson Baillie and Cole Linaker scored third period power play goals to send the game into overtime. Nothing was settled there before Tomas Soustal won it in the shootout. The Rockets fired 41 shots on net. The Rockets were 2 for 5 on the power play. In the big picture, the Rockets have points in 40 of 52 games (36-13-3-0).

Rockets Career Games Played List:

1)     Jason Deleurme: 341 games   5)  Gavin McLeod: 321 games

2)     Tyler Mosienko: 338 games     6)  Ryan Cuthbert: 319 games 

3)     Brett Palin: 324 games             7)  Brett McLean: 308 games 

4)     Tyson Baillie: 323 games

Number Crunching The Rockets have scored four regulation time goals in their last two games. All four goals have been scored in the third period and all four have been on the power play….The Rockets are 4 for 11 (36.4%) on the power play in their last two games.…The Rockets have out-shot the opponent in 6 straight games.      It is the first time that has happened this season…The Rockets have fired 142 shots on goal in the last three games or 47.3 shots per game…Michael Herringer has started in 25 of the teams last 28 games…Tyson Baillie is 11 points shy of 100. The last Rockets player to hit 100 points was Colin Long in 2007-2008…The Rockets have won 8 of their last 11 games overall...The Rockets are a combined 72-1-5-0 when leading after two periods when you combine this seasons totals and last seasons….The Rockets are one of only three teams in the WHL that have not lost when leading after 40 minutes. The Rockets are 31-0-2-0. The Kamloops Blazers and Prince Albert Raiders are also without a regulation loss after two periods …The Rockets are a combined 54-19-8-0 against BC Division teams on the road in the last five seasons…The Rockets are 25-4-1-0 when Tyson Baillie scores. The only regulation losses when the 20 year-old finds the back of the net were against Vancouver, Red Deer, Saskatoon and Kamloops…..The Rockets are attempting to become the first team in the WHL to reach the 50 win plateau in four straight seasons. For that to happen, the team must win 5 of their final 6 games…The Rockets have 6 games left in the regular season. Of those 6 games, 3 will be played on home ice. Of those 6 games, 4 are against BC Division rivals…The Rockets were 13-1-0-0 against Central Division opponents this season. The only loss came in Lethbridge in the sixth game of the season….The Rockets have been out-shot in 39 of 66 games this season… Riley Stadel has 12 fighting majors this season and 32 over his career….Justin Kirkland has 33 points in his last 27 games.

Who’s Hot: Lucas Johansen had 2+10=12 in February and has points in 9 of his last 11 games…Johansen has (1+9=10) over that period. Johansen has points in 13 of his last 16 games…Cole Linaker has points in 10 of his last 11 games. Linaker has 4+7=11 over that period…Linaker has a career high 46 points, seven more point than a season ago…Tyson Baillie has points in 11 of his last 14 games…Justin Kirkland had his 10 game point streak snapped Wednesday. Kirkland had 5+10=15 over that period…Kirkland has points in 12 of his last 14 games…The Rockets are 207-57-11-6 in their last 281 regular season games dating back to the start of the 2012-2013 campaign.