The Vernon Home Building Centre Midget Tier 2 Vipers stopped the North Zone Tier 1 Royals of Salmon 5-3 in exhibition hockey play Friday night in Sicamous.
With several key players out and affiliates Lincoln Connor and Noah Debalinhard in, the HomeBuilding boys beat the Royals for the third straight time this season.
Captain Dylan Sedlacek opened the scoring at 6:33 of the first period off a feed from DamianColjee-Fehr with Sedlacek jumping up ice to create a 2-on-1 and burying a glove-side wrister.
The Royals levelled the score at 4:26 of the first with a wrister from the point that eluded starterTy Sedlacek and took their only lead minutes later at 2:28 with Coljee-Fehr sitting in the sin binfor a retaliation penalty after getting dumped by a hip check from one of the North Zone d-men.
Dex Elders made it 2-2 when he rushed into the offensive zone from the left wing off a faceoff atthe blue line, picked off an errant pass across ice from the Royals defenceman and sniped ablocker-side beauty with 34 seconds left in the first period.
In the second frame, Joe Eggert got the Snakes rolling as a nice outlet pass from Cole Johnson toCaden Bracken set up Eggert’s low-blocker, seeing-eye snapper to make it 3-2 at 10:14.
The North Zone boys equalized on the powerplay as a weak wrist shot from the point wentuntouched past a screened Ty Sedlacek with 3:47 left in the second.
Mika Burns then connected off a hard redirect from Gavin Fleck just 36 seconds later to re-establish Vernon’s lead. Eric Noren gave the Vipers the cushion they needed with just 4:42 left inthe third, blasting a hard one-timer top shelf on the powerplay from Lee Christensen.
Meanwhile, the Thompson Okanagan Lakers stopped the Northern Capitals 3-1 in B.C. Midget AAAFemale Hockey League play Friday night at Plante Ice in Delta.
Jenna Fletcher of Vernon opened the scoring in the second period from Chanreet Bassi (Winfield).Defenceman Sydney Neustaeter (Winfield) made it 2-0 in the third when she stepped up to intercept a clearing pass, walked in around two Capitals and went high glove. Mairyn Tucker of Armstrong, on a blocked shot breakaway, scored in the last minute.