Going into Wednesday night’s game between the Merritt Centennials and the visiting Surrey Eagles, the fight for the final two playoff positions in the BCHL’s Interior division couldn’t be more intense.

The Centennials, the Salmon Arm Silverbacks and the West Kelowna Warriors are locked in no-holds-barred battle for the coveted final two spots in the post-season that gets underway the first week of March.

Tuesday night, both the Silverbacks and the Warriors won key contests in overtime, by identical 4-3 scores over the Langley Rivermen and Trail Smoke Eaters respectively.

As a result of those dramatic outcomes, the ’Backs and Warriors leapfrogged over the idle Centennials into third and fourth place in the Interior, two points ahead of Merritt.

All that could change again following Wednesday’s game. If Merritt defeats Surrey in regulation or overtime, they would move back into a three-way tie with Salmon Arm and West Kelowna, all with 64 points. The Cents would technically be in third place, however, as they have the most wins of the three teams.

Also working somewhat in Merritt’s favour is the fact that after Wednesday’s game, the Cents would still have two games left to play (the same as Salmon Arm), while West Kelowna is down to only one.

It could well come down to those final games of the regular season by each team before the playoff picture becomes clear.

Merritt will play a crucial game in Salmon Arm on Friday before hosting Trail on Saturday — the same day the Silverbacks visit Penticton to take on the Vees and West Kelowna wraps up its schedule against the Eagles.

The Cents went into Wednesday’s game with their fate clearly in their own hands. Win all three remaining games and they’re into the post-season. Lose Wednesday and they’re going to need some help on the final weekend.

The Cents had yet another chance to create some breathing space for themselves this past weekend, but managed only a split of their games ­— losing 4-1 to the Penticton Vees in a snoozer at the South Okanagan Events Centre on

Friday before waking up to defeat the Alberni Valley Bulldogs by the same score on home ice Sunday afternoon.

At the same time, the Silverbacks and Warriors were each winning both of their weekend games to make the tight Interior race just that much tighter.

Against Penticton, the Cents hardly looked like “a team fighting for their playoff lives” to quote the post-game write-up in the Okanagan Saturday the following morning. Their only bout of inspired play took place late in the first period and resulted in Merritt’s lone goal of the night, off the stick of defenceman Jake Clifford.

Meanwhile, the Vees were their usual efficient selves — relentless and opportunistic. Patrick Newell and Tyson Jost both scored on the powerplay, while Steen Cooper and Dakota Conroy made good on a pair of even-strength chances.

Between the pipes, Hunter Miska was solid for the Vees in turning aside 20 of 21 shots, while Merritt’s Jonah Imoo had to be very good in limiting the Vees to four goals on 35 quality opportunities.

Merritt did themselves no favours by visiting the sin bin on nine occasions and generally showing a lack of discipline all night. The Cents were forced to kill off a long five-on-three in the second period and took a four-minute spearing penalty in the final minutes of the game.

“With [Penticton], you have to try and sustain five to six minutes of pressure against them. You’re not going to just go down there and score,” Cents head coach and GM Luke Pierce said. “The penalties we took really prevented us from getting that momentum.

“There’s been a lot of talk about the officiating in the game, but we took some stupid penalties,” Pierce added. “Our guys showed frustration when the calls didn’t go their way, and they went out and started to be a bit silly. We have to do a better job of not showing our anger when things aren’t going our way.”

The Centennials seemed to get Pierce’s message for awhile on Sunday against a tired Bulldogs team that was playing its third game in as many days. They roared out of the gate, and were all business in establishing a quick 3-0 lead before the game was 15 minutes old. Gavin Gould opened the scoring, while Shane Poulsen and John Schiavo both notched powerplay markers.

“We really emphasized the importance of our start and showing some life,” Pierce said. “If you don’t put teams down early, it can make for a long game.”

Unfortunately, the Cents fell back into bad habits in the second period, choosing to mix it up with an ornery Alberni team that had lost the first two games of its weekend swing through the Interior. Merritt took eight of the 14 penalties handed out in the period and gave up the only goal of the middle stanza to the ’Dogs’ Scott Clark.

“We were in total control of the game,” Pierce said. “There was absolutely no reason for us to engage in any scrums at all. The flow of the game just gets killed.”

Pierce issued a bit of a warning to those players who can’t seem to show a degree of discipline on the ice.

“You want to be able to play everybody, but if we have a lead, I’m going to play those guys that I’m comfortable with and aren’t going to cost us by going out there and doing something selfish,” the coach said.

Things settled down somewhat in the final period against the Bulldogs, with Gould’s second of the night the only goal.

Merritt’s top line of Gould, Schiavo and Diego Cuglietta combined for 10 of the team’s 11 points in the game and drew the praise of their head coach.

“They’ve been playing really well for a couple of weeks, and maybe not capitalizing as much as they would like to. We need to get them really rolling along. Maybe Sunday was the start of something really good for them.”

Pierce also praised the work of Imoo on the weekend. Against the Bulldogs, the 20-year-old netminder was extremely busy — stopping 47 shots and dealing with a lot of traffic around his crease.

OVERTIME

Merritt defenceman Tyrell Buckley took a shot off the foot in Penticton and was unable to finish the game against the Vees or play on Sunday. His place in the lineup versus Alberni Valley was filled by Abbotsford’s Tyler Wickman.

The 16-year-old blueliner is playing this season for the Yale Hockey Academy.

In attendance at Sunday’s game against the Bulldogs were injured Centennials Malik Kaila and James Neil. Other Cents out of the lineup and gone for the season are Devin Oakes and Matt Foley.