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Mismatched pants and helmets, cages and peach-fuzzed faces were telling signs that it was the first pre-season game of the 2019-20 campaign between the West Kelowna Warriors and the Penticton Vees on Wednesday.
Photo Gallery (71 photos) on KelownaNowSports Facebook page
Still, the exhilaration of a fresh B.C. Hockey League season prevailed at Royal LePage Place.
Oh, and the hometown Warriors dropped a 2-1 decision to the Vees.
Penticton’s Thomas Stift scored with just under five minutes remaining in the game to lift the visitors to victory in a matchup that saw the older Warriors control much of the game only to be stymied by the outstanding goaltending of the Vees’ Marek Pocherwny and Cameron Milewski.
Logan Gallagher staked the Vees to a 1-0 first-period lead by deflecting a point shot by Joel Barton past the Warriors starting goaltender Johnny Derrick, a 17-year-old product of the West Van Academy Prep team.
The Warriors replied with an equalizer in the late stages of the second period — Riley Sharun, 16, and a West Kelowna minor hockey product who played with the Okanagan Minor Midget Rockets last season, doing the honours in familiar surroundings.
Much of the talk during and following the game surrounded the Vieten twins, the only two players in the game to which the Warriors are committed this season.
Both David and Drew Vieten, 18-year-old graduates of the Los Angeles Junior Kings U18 team, made an impressive debut wearing the Warriors colors.
In the second period, there were several sustained moments when the twins managed to control the play in the attacking zone. Drew was buzzing around making clutch plays to keep the puck in the Vees end while David was throwing his body while maintaining puck possession. Warriors fans couldn’t help but take notice whenever the California siblings stepped onto the ice.
While many of the young Warriors prospects were playing in what will likely be their only game in a Warriors jersey this season, some earned another look in a second pre-season encounter set for Friday at RLP beginning at 7 p.m. against the Salmon Arm Silverbacks.
West Kelowna head coach and general manager, Brandon West, plans to cut his current roster from 40 to 35 before Friday’s game and will likely insert more committed players into the lineup against the Silverbacks.
The Warriors continue exhibition play on Saturday in Salmon Arm while they’ll be in Penticton at the South Okanagan Events Centre on Wednesday before busing to Trail to take on the Smoke Eaters on Aug. 30.
They’ll close out their pre-season schedule on Aug. 31 when they meet the Smokies again, this time at Royal LePage Place starting at 6 p.m.
The 2019-20 regular season for the Warriors begins Sept. 6 when they open on home ice against the Vernon Vipers. They’ll play host to the defending BCHL-champion Wenatchee Wild on Sept. 7.
Photo Gallery (71 photos) on KelownaNowSports Facebook page
Photo Gallery (71 photos) on KelownaNowSports Facebook page
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