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Spud Kings players celebrate their third goal of the night, off the stick of William Donovan, as Ogden goalie Dilans Birkans looks at the puck in his goal. | Kalama Hines, EastIdahoSports.com
IDAHO FALLS — The Spud Kings flooded the Ogden crease and goalie Dilans Birkans in Monday’s Game 1, putting 39 shots on goal to the Mustangs’ 21. But that netted nothing in the 2-0 loss.
The Idaho Falls attack remained aggressive early Tuesday, but again Birkans was up to the task. That is, until William Strickland found the net with just over three minutes remaining in the first period. After all those shots — 49 through around 77 minutes of play — Strickland’s seemed to be the one that opened the gates to the Idaho Falls attack.
“It’s huge, just to get the monkey off the back — we were all saying on the bench, ‘We’ve just got to get one and the floodgates will open,’ and that’s what happened,” Strickland said after the game.
Spud Kings players celebrate their first goal of the NCDC Mountain Division Finals series, from William Strickland. | Kalama Hines, EastIdahoSports.com
Seventy-eight seconds later, Ryan Roethke beat Birkans on a two-on-one break with an assist from William Donovan. Then, 33 seconds into the second period, Donovan got his own goal.
The Spuds, who had trailed in each of their first six games of these Dineen Cup Playoffs, never trailed Tuesday and evened the best-of-five NCDC Mountain Division Finals series with a 3-1 win inside the Mountain America Center.
Head coach Anthony Bohn joked that while grabbing an early lead has been the goal throughout the playoffs, it just didn’t seem possible.
“That’s been the goal of every game, it just hasn’t happened,” he said with a laugh. “It was important for us, especially at home, to score the first one.”
Bohn’s team seemed like it was destined to, yet again, play from behind when, with 7:11 remaining in the first period of a scoreless game, Ogden was rewarded a penalty shot.
Captain Owen Hendrickson took the penalty, attacking Charlie Durkin from the Idaho Falls goalie’s right. Hendrickson threw his shot toward Durkin’s five-hole — between his legs — but Durkin lowered himself for a glove save.
Durkin denies the Hendrickson penalty shot. pic.twitter.com/SLtNKZmcWu
— Kalama Hines (@HINESight_2020) April 9, 2025
Asked what the save meant for his team, which avoided falling behind due to the save, Bohn called in “monumental.”
“Especially in a playoff series, like, holy cow,” the coach said. “I’ve never seen a penalty shot in a playoff game before. That was a huge save — a huge save for us, it allowed our guys to keep pressing the way they were.”
Strickland agreed with his coach, noting the massive energy boost the save injected into the Mountain America Center.
“It gives us the momentum, and shortly after that, that’s when we scored,” Strickland said. “That just got some energy in us, some energy in the crowd, and we took it and ran with it.”
four minutes and six second ran off the clock between Durkin’s save and Strickland’s score. Over the next three minutes and 38 seconds of game time, the Spud Kings added two more and grabbed a firm grasp on the outcome.
Spud Kings players attack Dilan Birkans and the Ogden goal with traffic in the goalie crease. | Kalama Hines, EastIdahoSports.com
Playing with the lead, Durkin, showed why he was named an All-Star this season, recording 32 saves and holding the Mustangs scoreless deep into the third period.
“He’s been our guy all year. He’s money,” Bohn said of the 19-year-old goaltender.
Ogden did finally get on the board with less than three minutes remaining in the game, on Denis Kuzmenkov’s fourth goal of the playoffs, but it was far too little and way too late.
Like they did against the Pueblo Bulls in the first round, the Spud Kings head onto the road after splitting the first two games at home. They fell at Pueblo last time, and will look to avoid being faced with the same situation — having to win back-to-back games to avoid elimination.
Asked what his team will need to do in order to avoid that situation, Bohn said:
“Whatever it takes. The goal is to, hopefully, learn from last series and come away with Game 3. But we’re not afraid to go the distance, that’s for sure. So if it takes us to five, we’ll go to five — whatever we need to do to come out on top.”
Strickland, who said the Spud Kings focus all season has been on playing “physical and fast” — forcing pressure to cause bad passes and break chances — said that will continue to be the approach Friday in Utah.
“At the end of the day, it’s a five-game series,” he said. “You’re trying to wear them down, wear them down. It may not affect them Game 1 and 2, but (Games) 4 and 5, they’ll start to feel and that’s the whole point.”
The Spud Kings celebrate their 3-1 win. | Kalama Hines, EastIdahoSports.com
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