The good news: the offensively-challenged Vancouver Giants scored five times against the stingiest defense in the WHL. The bad news: the Portland Winterhawks scored nine goals themselves, catapulting Vancouver into the league’s worst goals-against position and embarrassing the G-men in front of 7,318 fans who packed the Pacific Coliseum on Friday night.

It’s not an altogether surprising result: the Winterhawks have lost just three games in regulation this year, and sit tied for second in the W with the Eastern Conference-leading Calgary Hitmen. They came into the game riding a nine-game win streak, where the Giants were considering a 3-3 split in their last six games a moral victory. On paper, then, Portland should win this game.

But it isn’t an extra tick in the L column that hurts — it’s how the Giants lost that should have coaches running for their white boards. How often do you give up nine goals and come away thinking the scoreline flattered your team? The fact is, Portland outshot Vancouver 51-20. With decent goaltending and a few lucky bounces the Winterhawks could have won this one by a converted touchdown. (That’s not so far out of the realm of possibility as you might think. Last game the Giants took a 9-1 loss on the road against the Tri-City Americans.)

Vancouver has started a CHL tradition: the basement-dweller fire sale of elder players. Nathan Burns and David Musil, most notably, were traded in the past week for younger skaters and draft picks. In any league, when you let go of your strongest pieces an eighth of the way through the schedule, season ticket holders are in for a long year. In junior hockey, you’re trading 19-year-olds for guys who still have that big green N sticker on the back of the family car. Vancouver might steady things up somewhat, but the chances of making some noise about a playoff spot are already looking slim.

The Hawks, on the other hand, boast one of the CHL’s most exciting scorers in Delta-born Nic Petan, and a player threatening to go first overall in the NHL draft next summer in mammoth defenseman Seth Jones. (Take a look at this picture: listed at 6’4″ and still growing, Seth Jones just towers over other players on the ice. Normal, I guess, as he’s the son of former NBA power forward Ronald “Popeye” Jones.)

Defenseman Seth Jones (#3, the centre of the picture) is a potential #1 overall pick in the 2013 NHL Entry Draft, should that particular league ever bother to play again. For now anyway he’s a monster on the Portland Winterhawks blueline. Photo by Jason Kurylo for Pucked in the Head.

But hey, forget future draft picks. Their spot in the draft is just speculation at this point. The Hawks also feature Pittsburgh’s first-round pick in last year’s draft, defenseman Derrick Pouliot (8th overall), as well as a couple of second-rounders from two years ago, Tyler Wotherspoon (Calgary) and Ty Rattie (St Louis).

Twice the Giants came back from two-goal deficits to tie the game, at 3-3 in the second period and at 5-5 early in the third. Good on them for showing some compete, but it was the Hawks who dictated play from start to finish this night; the Giants had no business sniffing around for a point in this one, and it seemed they only got the puck into the Portland zone when the visitors had a mental lapse or started thinking about the bus ride after the game.

Despite giving up four goals in the third period, Giants goalie Tyler Fuhr made some spectacular saves after replacing fellow 16-year-old starter Payton Lee. His glove in particular gave Vancouver that chance to steal a point, in fact, as he made successive stops to keep it close and tied early in the third period: Taylor Peters on a breakaway and Chase De Leo when the score was 5-4 for Portland, and a lovely catch through traffic on a Seth Jones power play shot when it was 5-5. But this was a shooting gallery, folks. In all, Fuhr stopped 21 of 25 pucks in less than half a game’s work, while Lee halted 21 of 26 in his 35 minutes of play.

There were a couple of shots that Lee would like to have back, especially the first Portland goal, a snap shot on the rush that found a way through his equipment when he had the angle covered just two minutes after Anthony Ast opened the scoring for the home side. The fifth goal against wasn’t pretty either, a weak backhander from a bad angle by Taylor Leier just 11 seconds after Tyler Wotherspoon roofed a wrister — a brilliant snipe that you can’t blame Lee for — to break the 3-3 tie. Goaltending, however, can’t be blamed for this loss.

Portland outclassed Vancouver in every aspect of the game. Unfortunately, when you spend most of the game in your own end, you’re almost certain to get scored upon. Petan opened the floodgates at 7:21 of the third to put the Winterhawks up 6-5, and this time they weren’t going to let the Giants sneak back into the game with wonky goals. Portland’s starting goaltender Brendan Burke (son of former NHL goaltender Sean Burke) had let in five goals on 19 shots, probably daydreaming about his days playing midget hockey in Phoenix instead of facing an inferior squad on a cold, clear evening in Vancouver. But just in case Mac Carruth was planning on letting Trevor Cheek hit for the hat trick, Jones and the rest of the Portland D shut Vancouver down — Carruth faced just one, lonely shot in his 15 minute of ice while his mates put the screws to the Giants at the other end of the rink.

After giving up 18 goals in two starts, the Giants look to right the ship against the Prince George Cougars on Sunday, the first of four straight games against sub-.500 teams. The start time is 4pm in that one, so remember to head down early if you’re into some Sunday puck. (See what I did there? “Remember”? November 11? Oh, stop groaning and make sure you wear your poppy either way.)

Official Game Summary at WHL.ca
Game writeup at winterhawks.com
Coverage at theprovince.com