Everett, Wash.
Published: Friday, February 22, 2008

It's been a Jeykll-Hyde season for the Silvertips

At times they've been very good, other times they've been just bad

 EVERETT -- If you're a believer in trends and a follower of history, the Everett Silvertips' 4-3 overtime loss to Spokane on Wednesday night just doesn't go down well.

The loss snapped a five-game win streak for the Tips, which followed a five-game losing streak, which followed a six-game win streak, which followed similar ups and downs the entire year.

What's troublesome about the defeat to the Chiefs is the possibility -- if not a lock should the pattern continue -- of yet another deep tailspin. Streakiness is the major characteristic of the season. Patterns -- good and bad -- are to the Silvertips as scandals are to Presidential races.

It's been that way since the Silvertips began the season by losing their first four games. Wild momentum swings are the mode in 2007-08.

Everett will dominate for two weeks, then serve as a human welcome mat the next two.

The Silvertips are capable of beating any team in the Western Hockey League and going far in the playoffs. It's equally clear that they could lose to anyone and go down in the postseason with barely a whimper.

"It's just the game of hockey," forward Zack Dailey said. "It's the hockey gods. It's weird that we do that. It's weird when you play a good game and you lose and you play a bad game and you win. It's just how it goes. There's no real theory behind it."

Maybe not, but then again, something truly odd is going on around here. The Tips can whale on WHL powers such as Tri-City (Everett is 5-3 against the Americans) and Spokane (4-3). The Tips are 1-0 against Eastern Conference-leading Calgary.

Yet, they lost five straight to Seattle, a team just ahead of them in the conference standings. They lost 3-0 at home to Portland, a team that is simply a mess. They dropped a 2-1 home game Jan. 29 to lowly Prince Albert, a team long out of the Eastern Conference playoff race.

When the Silvertips are good, they can be very good. Scary good. But when they're bad, it's unexplainable.

"It's not like we prepare sometimes and sometimes we don't," center Zach Hamill said. "We prepare for every game the same way. It's just the way we are and our competitive nature. It's tough to give you an answer. We go into every game the same way. If we win, great. If we lose, we go back in and look at it and look forward to the next game."

The Tips came back from their season-opening four defeats by winning 14 of their next 17 games, which included a sub-streak of eight victories in nine contests.

Following that were four straight defeats, three straight victories, five straight losses and punctuated by a fairly sane 4-4 mark around Christmas.

On Dec. 29, Everett went on a 5-1 run, the only loss being to Chilliwack at home. Then came the latest puzzling string of six wins in a row, then five defeats, then five victories.

It's as strange as the 2007 Mariners, who alternated win streaks of eight, five and four with losing streaks of six, seven five and nine.

The roller-coaster ride suggests emotional immaturity. Who loves to be in the middle of six straight defeats? How can that fail to whip up on a young player's psyche? By the same token, who doesn't zip through traffic to get to the arena when he's won five straight games?

Dailey says that's not the case.

"We have a good group of guys," he said. "We don't get too high or too low when we're on those streaks. We just play our hardest every game."

Injuries and a heavy schedule were a part of the latest five-game losing streak, coach John Becanic said. The Tips were down three defensemen and star forward Kyle Beach was out with a concussion.

"When you take four guys out of the lineup -- and then we had Spokane, Seattle, Kelowna and Vancouver -- you're battling," Becanic said. "But I've said all along that we wanted to play playoff hockey the second half of the year. But for our first two games back from the break (losses at Tri-City and Seattle), we've been pretty darn good.

"I know we lost those five games, but again, if I looked at our lineup and who we were missing, it's understandable. We're starting to get some guys back, beating some pretty good teams and are now showing some consistency again against some very good hockey teams."

With 10 regular-season games left and injured guys filtering back in, this is the prime time for the Silvertips to establish a trend they can live with.

Sports columnist John Sleeper: sleeper@heraldnet.com. For Sleeper[`]s blog, "Dangling Participles," go to www.heraldnet.com/danglingparticiples.
© 2009The Daily Herald Co., Everett, WA