By Patrick Burles - @PatrickBurles on Twitter

Cougars stun Hurricanes with third period comeback

Jan 13, 2017 | 11:23 PM

LETHBRIDGE – It started as frenzied excitement, then turned to muted disbelief.

If the Lethbridge Hurricanes weren’t superstitious before their tilt with the WHL leading Prince George Cougars Friday (the 13th) night, they just might be now, after blowing a big lead and falling 6-5 in a shootout.

From the drop of the puck the Enmax Centre was energized. The Hurricanes came out of the gate flying, with Jordy Bellerive scoring his 20th of the season 4:51 into the game and Brennen Riddle adding another less than a minute later. Prince George responded only 48-seconds later, but Jaden Joseph would fire home his first of the year before the end of the opening period, giving the Canes a 3-1 lead and all the momentum.

That carried over strongly into the second, with the Hurricanes winning virtually every foot race and puck battle.

While killing a penalty early in the second, Canes’ defenceman Brennan Menell picked off a weak pass attempt by the Cougars and streaked in alone for a shorthanded goal. Team captain, Tyler Wong would get in on the action as well, scoring his club leading 30th goal a few minutes later, putting the Hurricanes up 5-1 and seemingly in the driver’s seat as the period closed.

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Whatever was said in the Cougar’s locker room during the second intermission though, it worked.

Coming out in the third, it became clear that the Cougars weren’t going to give up and that the Hurricanes had started to sit back. A Prince George power-play goal cut the Hurricanes lead by one at the 5:13 mark, and was followed by a shorthanded goal two minutes later, sending a wave of nervous energy through the building with the Hurricanes advantage trimmed to 5-3. Lethbridge started struggling to exit their zone, turning the puck over repeatedly and leaning on goaltender Stuart Skinner to hold off the barrage. The Cougar’s Brogan O’Brien would finally complete the comeback, scoring a pair of goals to even the score at 5-5 in the final 10 minutes of regulation and leaving Hurricanes fans in stunned silence.

To their credit, the Hurricanes rebounded noticeably in overtime, putting together several quality scoring chances at three-on-three that forced Cougar’s goalie Nick McBride to make a couple of highlight real saves.

With OT solving nothing, the two clubs moved to the shootout.

Nikita Popugaev shot first for Prince George, beating Skinner with a quick move to his backhand that proved to be the game winner.

The loss drops the Hurricanes record to 23-15-3-3, although, with the point for making it to extra time, the team is currently riding a four-game point streak and still has a six-point lead over Red Deer in the Central Division.

The other good news for the Canes is that they won’t have to think about the setback long, as they host the Edmonton Oil Kings Saturday (Jan. 14), a team they beat by a score of 7-4 twice within the last seven days.