The Williams Lake Stampeders extended its win streak to three games Saturday night in Williams Lake, beating the Prince Rupert Rampage, 10-3, in a goal-scoring bonanza.
Prince Rupert set the tone early when Jordan Weir beat Williams Lake netminder Richard Ward to put the Rampage up a goal early, however, Williams Lake would explode for four unanswered goals before the buzzer sounded to end the opening frame.
Tyrel Lucas, Dave Gore, Greg Nickel and two markers from Stu Sasges gave Williams Lake a 4-1 edge heading in the second period.
There, the young Rampage squad stomped its feet back on the gas, playing to a 1-1 tie in the frame with the Stampeders.
Williams Lake’s Matt Lees added his first of the game in the second, while Craig Munro lit the lamp for Prince Rupert.
“They [Prince Rupert] had a much better second period than we did,” said Stampeders head coach Cliff Philpot.
In the third, however, it was all Stampeders as Derrick Walters, with two, Lucas and Sasges — who completed his hat trick — scored to put the contest on ice. The Rampage’s Jeff Stromdahl scored the lone goal for his club in the period.
Ward, who stopped 31 of 34 shots on goal, picked up his first win between the pipes for the Stamps this season while starting netminder Justin Foote given the night off.
“It was a good game,” Philpot said of his team’s effort.
“Prince Rupert had three lines tonight and our guys were playing really well.
“We had our offensive game going, for sure.
“They opened the scoring and we pulled off four in a row there in the first period and that made the difference.”
Williams Lake, with the win, improved to 6-2-1 on the campaign, but fell to one point back of the first-place Quesnel Kangaroos in the Central Interior Hockey League East Division after they finished with two wins (10-2 versus the Lac La Hache Tomahawks and 8-2 versus the Rampage) over the weekend.
The Rampage, members of the CIHL’s West Division, slipped to 2-6-0 on the season.
Williams Lake has this weekend off, before travelling south to Lac La Hache to face the Tomahawks Saturday, Nov. 23, and Sunday, Nov. 24, at the Rolf Zeis Memorial Arena.
Puck drop is 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 1 p.m. Sunday.