Portland comes to TV with Seattle games and a Spokane game. Better get your DVR ready as the Hawks will be hitting the small screen this weekend with the first of eight games to be shown on CW 32.
Games against Seattle, plus a special Spokane game, will be on CW starting this Saturday, March 20. All televised games will start at 5 pm.
Other games will be Saturday, March 27, Sunday, March 28, Saturday, April 10 at Spokane, Saturday, April 17, Saturday, April 24, Sunday, April 25, and Sunday, May 2. If you have the chl.ca app or watch it on your computer, the other games will need a subscription.
The Communications department within the Winterhawks doubled in a day when Nick Marek, who holds down the fort as the Broadcasting and Communications Manager, was able to add an addition to Walt Ruff. The addition will allow Nick to communicate further in press releases, TV, and other forms of media and not be stretched so thin.
The Hawks opened up the 2020-21 abbreviated schedule with a road game in Kennewick where they faced the Tri-City Americans. Mason Mannek started the season with the Hawks’ first goal just over six minutes in a while on their second powerplay. Tri-City would tie it up late in the first period, but Portland regained the lead with a determined effort by Reese Newkirk, who banged it home to restore the lead. Midway through the second period, Tri City’s Sasha Mutala evened up the score again, and it remained that way through the third period.
Portland got into penalty trouble in the Overtime period with Jaydon Dureau and Nick Cicek getting penalty markers less than a minute apart. Portland had a glorious chance out front, but Taylln Boyko dove out and made a spectacular save on Simon Knak. In the end, Tri-City was able to move the puck into the Hawks zone and, after several around the horn passes, were finally able to stretch the Hawks apart enough for Samuel Huo to get one past Dante Giannuzzi with just over forty-five seconds left in the game to steal the win.
Tri-City outshot Portland 33-29 and went two of five on the powerplay, with Portland scoring just the once on five tries with the man advantage.
Other games saw Winnipeg power past Moose Jaw Warriors 5-2, scoring once on 4 man advantage tries and giving up one on two chances to Moose Jaw. They outshot them 36-28. Swift Current Broncos faced Brandon Wheat Kings and dropped a 4-1 decision. The Broncos gave up two goals within fourteen seconds just past the seven-minute mark, and though they got one back late in the first period to halve the score, Brandon scored midway through the third and added a late third-period empty-net goal to get the win. Brandon got a shot advantage of 39-27, with Brandon picking up one powerplay goal on five tries with Swift Current nabbing one goal on two occasions.
Earlier in the week, the East’s bubble continued with Winnipeg scoring a 2-1 overtime win over the Saskatoon Blades and Regine squeaking past Swift Current Broncos 3-2. Swift Current outshot the Pats 35-30 but could only capitalize on their 8 man-advantage opportunities.
The schedule now gets going with a heavy week with Saturdays featuring six games and other games filtered during the week as the BC Division now games online next week to round out all the Division action.
