After struggling to generate goals against the Victoria Grizzlies earlier in the week, the Bulldogs exploded for 8 goals in a 8-3 rout of the Powell River Kings in front of 1301 fans at the Multiplex on Saturday night.
Just one game after seeing his league-leading 19 game point streak come to an end, Nicholas Beneteau got to work on a new streak as he paced the Bulldogs offence with a hat-trick and added an assist. The goals were Beneteau’s 18th, 19th and 20th of the season.
Beneteau’s line-mate Will Elger had a career high 4 assist night for the Bulldogs. Elger, a rookie from Weterville Ohio now has 16 goals and 28 assists for 44 points on the season.
Ethan Bono (16th), Chase Klassen (11th), Tristan Taylor (4th), Matt Kursonis (10th) and Matthew Maltais (12th) also scored in the Bulldogs 28th win of the campaign.
A wild scene late in the 3rd period saw Bulldogs goalie Campbell Arnold get ejected after becoming involved in a scrum in front of the Bulldogs net. Arnold stopped 25 of 28 before giving way to Hobie Hedquist who made 2 saves in mop-up duty. The rough-stuff also saw Tristan Taylor get ejected. Logan Holm of the Bulldogs, and Anthony Lucarelli and Sam Schoenfeld of the Kings also received Misconducts at 16:32 of the 3rd.
The Bulldogs outshot the Kings 35-30 on the night and with the win, took the season series with a record of 5-2-0-0 against Powell River.
The Bulldogs will now hit the road for the final time in the regular season with stops in Surrey on Friday night and Chilliwack on Saturday.
With 60 points, the Bulldogs sit 3rd in the Coastal Conference, however the teams behind them all have multiple games in hand. The playoff picture in the Coastal Conference is still quite murky as far as how the match-ups might look. The Bulldogs could finish anywhere from 3rd to 6th in the standings. The top 4 teams in the conference will secure home-ice advantage for the Coastal Conference Quarter-Finals that begin on March 31st.
The final home game of the season is Friday March 24th when the Bulldogs host the Victoria Grizzlies. The Bulldogs will honour their six 20-year old graduating players in a pre-game ceremony. Tickets for the 24th can be purchased by CLICKING HERE.
