Panthers knocked off in pair of weekend games but make ready for the Islanders on Friday

The Peninsula Panthers were riding high going into a pair of weekend games against the VIJHL-leading Campbell River Storm but after dropping both ends of the home-and-home series, there is much more work to be completed.

On Friday night, the squad did not show up for most of the sixty minutes and paid a dear price being bounced 6-2 by the visitors.  And on Sunday, although they played a stellar forty minutes, penalty problems wrote most of the script in a 9-2 shellacking.

Head Coach Brad Tippett had high expectations going into the weekend but there were still lessons to be learned in the pair of losses.

"The game Friday was one of those where you just throw the video away as it was nowhere close to a normal performance by our team.  It was just a night where nothing we did went right.  We had pucks bounce over sticks, we simply did not execute.  Logan Speirs was our best player that night.  Going into Sunday, we just wanted to hit the reset button and get back to playing Panthers hockey.  We wanted.to use our speed and make things happen, as opposed to Friday where we watched things happen. I thought for the first forty minutes we played very hard and smart, the little melee at the end of the 2nd period put us two men short for a full two minutes and set the tone for a long 3rd period.  Still and all it was a huge improvement from our first visit to Campbell River back in September."

The Panthers look to get back into the win column on Wednesday night when they travel out to the Westshore when they face off against the Wolves at the Q Centre.  And they will be back home Friday night at 7:30 p.m. in the friendly confines of the Panorama Recreation Centre when they play host to the Kerry Park Islanders.