Ity started well, but it didn’t end the way the Vancouver Giants wanted.
G-men were ahead 2-0 Friday night in Victoria, only to have the Royals roar back, getting one in the second and four in the third for a 5-2 defeat at Save on Foods Memorial Centre.
Giants were up 1-0 after 20 minutes and added to their lead early in the second. Victoria cut the lead in half with 33 seconds left in the second period. The Royals scored three times in the first 5:25 of the third period to make it 4-2 and added an empty net goal to put the game to bed at 5-2.
Vancouver falls to 24-37-1-2 (51 points), while Victoria improves to 27-28-6-3 (63 points).
Jakob Oreskovic and Lance McCloskey had the tallies for the Giants.
Ludovic Perreault, Eli McKamey, Heath Nelson, Miles Cooper and Nolan Stewart each found the back of the net for Victoria.
The Giants needed less than four minutes to open the scoring, when Colton Gerrior fed Oreskovic a breakaway pass, who made no mistake, snapping the puck past Jake Pilon on the blocker side.
Vancouver killed off 56 seconds of a Royals 5-on-3 to keep the 1-0 advantage after 20 minutes.
Just 2:16 into the second period, McCloskey doubled the Giants’ lead with a shot from the right boards.
Perreault got the Royals on the board with a great individual effort late in the second period, scoring his 20th of the season.
McKamey scored off a rush just 1:58 into the third period, which was quickly followed by goals from Nelson on a power play and Cooper at 5-on-5, to all of a sudden give the Royals a 4-2 lead.
Stewart hit the empty net with only 12.5 seconds left to ice the game.
Next, Giants host Victoria on Saturday night at 7 p.m. in the Langley Events Centre, before heading to Seattle on Sunday.