The Brief

• The Tri-City Americans swept both games of their road series against the Prince George Cougars on Oct. 23 and 24, their first road sweep of the Cougars in seven years.

• Center Grady Martin scored three goals across the two games after going scoreless through his first seven games of the season.

• The Americans, now 6-6-1, have turned around a 0-5 start by leaning into their underdog status as one of the youngest rosters in the league.

KENNEWICK, Wash. — The Tri-City Americans swept the Prince George Cougars on the road on Oct. 23 and 24, the first time the Americans have won both games of a road series against Prince George in seven years.

Center Grady Martin led the way. Through his first seven games of the season, Martin had no goals and dealt with injuries. In the two games in Prince George, he scored three goals and helped the Americans secure both wins.

Head coach Jody Hull said the breakthrough was a matter of time.

"It was just a matter of time before he was going to start to score some goals and he picked a great time to get it going for us up there," Hull said.

The Americans lost their first five games of the season. Since then, the team has rebounded to a 6-6-1 record. Martin said the early losses were a slow start, but the first win changed the team's momentum.

"I think it was a slow start with the losses there but I feel like once we got that first win things are really rolling for us," Martin said. "We're kind of buying into the underdog mentality a little bit being the younger team in the league. I think we're doing really well and rolling pretty good."

The Americans embraced that underdog role on the 12-hour road trip to Prince George. Defenseman Jaxen Adam said the building can be a tough place to play.

"We haven't won there in a little while, it's a tough barn to play in, tough trip to go on," Adam said. "But got our legs under us quick and we were playing our game, and when we're playing our game it's tough to play against. We were just clicking and the boys are buzzing and everyone was gelling good, so that's kind of why we had our success."

The Americans will look to build on that momentum. They travel to Penticton to face the Vees on Friday, then return home to Kennewick to play the Medicine Hat Tigers on Halloween night.