The young Surrey Eagles couldn’t have picked a worse time to lay their first egg of the season. In front of 100-plus college and professional scouts, the Eagles looked their age in a lackadaisical 6-2 loss to the Nanaimo Clippers in the B.C. Hockey League’s Showcase Festival on Wednesday afternoon at the Chilliwack Coliseum.
Things started well enough as Surrey’s Jesse Carr scored his first BCHL, shorthanded no less, 4:23 into the game. Ten minutes later the Eagles were up by two after Brandon Santa Juana scored from high in the slot.
That, and the fact Surrey welcomed back three regulars from injury, was it from the positives file. Nanaimo’s Ethan Scardina beat Surrey goaltender Thomas Scarfone twice in the final five minutes of the first period to even things up, then assisted on two of Nanaimo’s three second period goals as the Clippers relentlessly pulled away. Scarfone, who was making his fourth straight start between the pipes as his netminding partner Cal Schell continues to nurse an upper body injury, did what he could and gave up no softies while facing 39 shots.
Surrey coach Cam Keith was left both puzzled and downcast by the surprising lack of effort. “I don’t know how to explain it other than the guys must have been in that mode where they wanted to impress individually and it worked against us,” said Keith, who has seen the league’s youngest team put up good effort after good effort in their first nine games of the season. “I was disappointed with our lack of intensity at times. I thought we were watching, and hesitant.”
“Nobody stepped up, and then an older team just outplayed us. They took the spotlight and ran with it. By comparison, we were lethargic. We didn’t have any bite tonight, and that was, again, disappointing.”
Defenseman Jimmy Darby and Juliano Santalucia, and forward Gabe Schovanek all returned from injuries for Surrey, who lost for the sixth times in eight games to fall two games below .500 at 4-6. The win was the second straight for Nanaimo, one of the stingiest teams in the league defensively, and they improved to 4-3-1.
Surrey gets a shot at redemption right away as they play their second Showcase Festival game Thursday afternoon in Chilliwack. It will be a challenge, however, as they take on the Cowichan Valley Capitals, who have beaten the Eagles twice already this season. That game will start at 4:00pm.
