With a dominant second period on Wednesday, the Portland Winterhawks re-established home ice advantage in their Western Hockey League playoff series against the Everett Silvertips.
By winning Game 3 by a score of 7-3 at Comcast Arena in Everett, the Winterhawks also re-discovered the high-voltage offense that helped them to the league’s best record in the regular season.
“We were able to establish a forecheck” in the second period, Winterhawks assistant coach Kyle Gustafson said. “We played a lot of minutes in the offensive zone, played with possession and really limited the (Everett) chances coming back.”
Game 4 is 7:35 p.m. on Friday at Everett, and Game 5 is at 7 p.m. Saturday at Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Portland.
Portland’s top line of Ty Rattie, Nic Petan and Brendan Leipsic produced four goals and five assists Wednesday. Petan had two goals and two assists.
“We didn’t try to do too much,” Petan said. “We capitalized on our power play. The main thing is to keep it simple and not try to be too fancy out there.”
Everett briefly had life early in the third period, as Joshua Winquist and Dawson Leedahl scored 21 seconds apart and pulled the Silvertips within 5-3. More than 13 minutes remained, but any momentum that Everett created disappeared 48 seconds later.
Derrick Pouliott flipped the puck toward the goal from neutral ice. Goalie Daniel Cotton, who replaced starter Austin Lotz at the start of the third period, had the puck hit his glove and bounce into the goal.
Leipsic made it 7-3, scoring on the power play with 10:52 remaining. For the night, Portland was 3 for 5 on the power play and outshot Everett 30-13.
• Memorial Cup host Saskatoon was swept out of the Western Hockey League playoffs, losing 3-1 at Medicine hat on Wednesday as the Tigers won the series 4-0.
• In another looming upset, Kelwna avoided being swept by Seattle, winning 4-0 in Kent. Seattle leads that series 3-1.
