Portland Winterhawks Still Tops In Western Conference Despite Slip

With a third of the season cleared, General Manager and coach Mike  Johnston can start to figure out where the team’s direction is headed. Currently,  the Hawks hold down first place and have a few games before the Christmas break, where they will play a couple of games before heading on the Eastern Swing.

In the past couple of weeks, the Hawks have done something they haven’t done all season, and that’s run a three-game losing streak.

Things went OK for the Hawks leading into Thanksgiving with a 3-to-3 overtime win over Kamloops and a 4-to-1 win over Everett. 

They had games against Seattle and Vancouver and returned against Seattle, which led to their losing streak. 

The first game against Seattle was a rough 6 to 1 loss, and a rare time shots favored the opposition handily. Against Vancouver, a 3 to 1 loss continued their woes, and a return shot against Seattle didn’t earn them points either In a 3 to 1 loss. 

They returned to face Victoria Royals, hoping to regain their winning ways. In that game, they again fell behind the eight ball when they gave up the first goal. They tied the game and then saw a pair of powerplay goals within a minute to take the game 3 to 1.

The following day, they headed to Everett, where they took on the Silvertips. Dropping a 4 to 3 overtime decision to Everett at least got them a point as they keep Seattle at bay.

Next are games at home versus Prince George on Wednesday and Teddy Bear Toss on Saturday which is expected to be a sellout as less than 1,000 tickets remain.

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About Stuart Kemp 375 Articles
Stuart Kemp is the Immediate Past President of 15 years of the Booster Club. and has been following hockey from his native Canada since he can remember, though he can't skate, but played road hockey for several years. Loving hockey and professional wrestling, he has traveled to most of the WHL cities and with wrestling, has seen four provinces and five states. It is true that every Canadian city with more than 500 residents has a hockey rink, well at least it looks that way. Stuart has had his hand in every facet of independent Professional wrestling as he debuted as an announcer in 1986 which started his career.