Panthers split pair on weekend

The Peninsula Panthers are about to reach the midway point in their 48-game schedule next Sunday afternoon in Oceanside and the Club is looking to turn the corner much in the same way it did last season right around the same time.  Searching for wins, the Panthers edged the Nanaimo Buccaneers by a 1-0 count on Thursday night backed by great goaltending of Shawn Parkinson and a 2nd period marker from the stick of Drew Coughlin.  But the Team returned to the Panorama the following night and could not rebound from a couple early goals in the 1st period enroute to a 7-2 loss at the hands of the Victoria Cougars.

"We went into Nanaimo - which is a tough building to play in - and came out with two hard-earned points," said Pete Zubersky.  "Our kids really put it on the line all night long; every single one of them and the result was a win.  We came back into our building on Friday and I thought that a number of guys were soft and we simply cannot be successful when we do not have everyone pulling on the rope together.  That being said, we are looking to turn the corner and I think we will see an effort next weekend to put us right back into the win column.  At the end of next weekend we will be at the halfway point in our season, it's time for our guys to start to play hard."

The youngest player on the Club is Shota Yamamoto who will not turn 16 until late this month.  "Shota has been our best player in a lot of games and he comes to the rink every single night to prove something.  I have seen him stick up for kids on our club who are five years older than he is and on many nights, including in our game against the Cougars on Friday, he was our best defenceman.  I mentioned it on the bench on Friday.  If every kid on our club played with his heart, we would be winning a lot of games.  If the rest of our defence played with the heart that Yamamoto is showing, we could pull out of our funk right away.  The talent is there."

The Panthers get back at it next Friday night when they host the Comox Valley Glacier Kings with the puck set to drop at the Panorama Recreation Centre at the usual 7:30 pm.