PJHL Media
Once again, the PJHL season will go into April with Easter Monday, April Fool’s Day and Stonehouse Cup Game 7 all converging at the same spot on the calendar.
For the Ridge Meadows Flames and the Richmond Sockeyes, it all comes down to Monday’s Game 7 in Richmond in a 4 p.m. puck drop.
The Flames forced this best-of-seven series the distance with a big 6-2 win at home Saturday night. Theo Kochan was a man on a mission for the Flames in Game 6 after being held off the scoresheet in the previous two games. Kochan earned 1st Star after he scored the first two goals of the game, a do-or-die contest after Richmond had won Games 4 and 5. Kochan later set up an insurance marker early in the third to keep the Flames in command of Game 6. The Pitt Meadows native now has five goals and two assists in the Finals and the Flames have won each game that he has scored a goal.
Richmond’s special teams have been massive weapons for them in the Finals. They scored three times with the man advantage in a 7-0 Game 4 win at Ridge Meadows when they evened the series 2-2 and also notched a shorthanded tally in that game. Another PP goal and a shorty came for the Sockeyes in a 4-1 Game 5 win at home; Nicholas Noren has been the author of the Richmond’s last two shorthanded goals and now has six shorties out of his 10 in the postseason.
Going into Game 7, the Flames will remember the experience of last season when they went the distance against the Delta Ice Hawks only to come up just short. The Flames’ win in Game 6 proves to them they can get it done in regulation against Richmond, after winning Games 1 and 3 in overtime. The Sockeyes lost just once in regulation during the regular season, an Oct. 19 setback to Delta.
Game 7 goes at 4 p.m. Monday from Richmond’s Minoru Arena.
