Victoria twice held one-goal leads, only to let it slip away in the setback to the Eagles, who improved to 5-7-1-1 while the Grizzlies slipped to 7-6-0-0, following losses of 5-4 in Trail on Friday and 4-2 in Penticton on Saturday.
鈥淭hree good teams,鈥� said Grizzlies general manager and head coach Craig Didmon, whose team outshot the Eagles 40-29. 鈥淲e had 23 shots in the third period. We just couldn鈥檛 put the puck in the net.
鈥淭hat happens 鈥� we just have to get better. Our specialty teams have to get better and we have to be more consistent throughout the 60 minutes,鈥� added Didmon of a 0-for-5 performance on the power play. The Grizzlies allowed one man-advantage goal on seven Surrey opportunities.
鈥淚t鈥檚 hard to be upset when you play your ninth period in three days and, with the travel we had, we still went out there and threw everything we had at them and outplayed them in the third,鈥� added Didmon.
鈥淚 guess you鈥檝e got to hand it to them, they didn鈥檛 go out and quit and we just didn鈥檛 have any luck [scoring],鈥� he said of Sunday鈥檚 result. 鈥淚f we put the nine periods together, we probably only took about two off, so it鈥檚 unfortunate that we didn鈥檛 come out with any points.鈥�
Shawn Parkinson started in goal for the Grizzlies on Sunday after Zack Rose had played back-to-back in the first two games of the exhausting trip. Parkinson made 25 saves.
鈥淲e had three good performances in goal. It鈥檚 not the goalies,鈥� said Didmon.
Jamie Rome had a goal and an assist and 16-year-old defenceman Jacson Alexander also scored for the Grizzlies, who led 2-1 midway through the game before surrendering goals 3:37 apart to Chase Danol and Aaron White late in the middle frame.
Ryan Brushett had the first Surrey goal and John Wesley and Ty Westgard (empty net) had third-period markers, despite being outshot 23-11 in the final 20 minutes.
The Grizzlies return to action on Wednesday, playing host to the Alberni Valley Bulldogs (5-5-1-1), who sit just two points back of Victoria in the Island Division standings with a game in hand.
