All the marbles on the table Sunday night in Campbell River - Game 7

The Peninsula Panthers and the Campbell River Storm have gone through their first six games in the best-of-7 series and almost nothing has been decided.  Almost nothing.  The two Clubs each have three wins under their belts and only one of them will get to the next one.  And that will be decided this Sunday night at 8:15 pm up in Campbell River when this incredible and hard-fought series will start once again and will end.  It will be Game 7 with the winner-take-all.

"We are exactly where we want to be," explained Panthers' Governor Pete Zubersky.  "Going into this series if we were told that we would be going into a winner-take-all game, we would have been happy to do just that.  I think the pressure is all on the Storm Club; we have none.  They will have a crazy barn on Sunday night and there will be 1000 fans who are expecting their Club to take the game.  They have had a good season.  We have had a great series.  This one is a long way from being decided, a long, long way."

The Panthers had an opportunity to end the series last Tuesday in Campbell River but were on the wrong end of a 3-2 triple overtime loss.  And Friday night at the Panorama Recreation Centre they dropped a 3-1 decision to the Storm, albeit, they were victims of an empty net marker when they had Goaltender Connor McKillop on the bench with only 14 seconds remaining in the contest.

"Little things matter so much," said Zubersky.  "We said right at the start of this series that we were not going to win 7-6 but that the games had to have a low number for us to come out on top.  No game has had the winner score more than four and I expect the same on Sunday night.  We have to play a simple game.  The puck has to go out and we have to get it deep whenever we have the opportunities.  It's not time for ticky-tack hockey.  The little things matter and a little mistake will decide the winner in Game 7."

The Storm opened the scoring at the 17:31 mark of the opening stanza on a Tyler Chyzowski tally.  And at the 13:29 mark, Mike Dyck extended the lead when the Panthers coughed up a puck in their own end.

But it was far from over and the Panthers came back as they have continually done in this series.  At the 2:15 mark and on the power play, the lightening-fast Jonah Ragsdale beat Storm Goaltender Aaron de Kok to make it a 2-1 contest.  Alex Benger and Carson Cox were awarded a couple helpers on the play.

The Panthers pushed hard and had some great opportunities in the next 12 minutes of the game but ran into some penalty problems with just six minutes to go and ended up playing short-handed for the remainder of the game.

"Matt Sparrow got nailed four minutes on a slew-footing call with just over six minutes left to go," quipped Zubersky.  "I thought it might have been a no-call as both guys were completely tangled up, but the refs saw it differently and that is part of the game.  The guy landed on Sparrow which made it even tougher to digest and at that time of the game and with a lot of chips pushed out on the table in a big Game 6, I would liked to have seen that one left as a 'Play on.'  The officials have done a great job in the series, I just saw that call a bit differently and that's fine.  I know they will do a good job in Game 7 once again."

The Panthes pulled McKillop with just under a minute to go however, it simply made the situation 5-on-5 skaters due to penalty problems.  They had a couple cracks on De Kok but the Storm managed to break out of the zone and Josh Pederson was sent in all alone on the empty cage and made no mistake in potting the insurance marker. 

If the Panthers knock off the Storm Sunday night, they will advance to Round 2 against the Victoria Cougars on Thursday night at 7:15 pm.  Game 2 is slated for Friday night in the friendly confines of the Panorama Recreation Centre.  Follow the Panthers for updates.