Watterodt’s first career WHL goal seals Blades 4-1 win

Vaughn Watterodt (#18) celebrates his first career WHL goal.

Vaughn Watterodt delivered for his family.

Entering Saturday, the 17-year-old sophomore left-winger with the Saskatoon Blades was still in search of his first career WHL goal. With some special family members in among the 2,207 spectators in attendance at the SaskTel Centre, Watterodt scored that milestone tally in a very timely moment.

With the Blades holding on to a 2-1 edge over the visiting Swift Current Broncos in a WHL regular season clash, Watterodt netted his first career WHL goal with 2:51 remaining in the third period to extend the host side’s lead to 3-1. The marker was a nice one too, as Watterodt tipped home a point shot from centre Spencer Shugrue for the key insurance tally.

Spencer Shugrue puts a point shot on goal that gets tipped home.

The Blades cruised to a 4-1 victory from there.

Watterodt was pumped to get his first career WHL goal playing for the team he grew up cheering for. He is from Rosetown, Sask., which is located about 100-kilometres west of Saskatoon.

“It was really awesome,” said Watterodt, who was playing in his 31^st career WHL game. “I finally got the monkey off my back, and I was able to do it in front of my parents and my grandma.

“It was my first game my grandma got to see me play in the WHL, so it was really nice to be able to do that for her.”

Vaughn Watterodt (#18) reacts to scoring his first WHL goal.

Watterodt, who stands 5-foot-11 and weighs 181 pounds, started his WHL career with the Kamloops Blazers and came to the Blades in a trade back on December 2, 2021. He was skating in his 13^th career game with the Blades on Saturday.

On the play where he scored his milestone first goal, Watterodt decided to go to the net after he saw that Shugrue won a race to a loose puck at the right point spot in the Swift Current zone.

“I saw he (Shugrue) had time,” said Watterodt. “I just wanted to get to the net and create a screen on the goalie.

“I was able to tip that in, so it was nice.”

Watterodt’s goal helped the Blades prevail in a contest that was a fairly tight battle.

Having beaten the Broncos 6-4 in Swift Current on Friday night, the Blades got out to a good start in Saturday’s rematch that closed out a home-and-home series.

Kyle Crnkovic scored twice for the Blades on Saturday.

They opened the game’s scoring at the 6:41 mark of the opening frame thanks to a nice setup pass from 16-year-old defenceman Tanner Molendyk. Molendyk broke into the offensive zone on a rush and put a sweet pass across the face of the Swift Current to star left-winger Kyle Crnkovic, who tapped home his 20^th of the season to give the hosts a 1-0 lead.

The 19-year-old Crnkovic hit the 20-goal mark for the second time in his WHL career with the first of his two tallies on the night.

Shortly after that marker, the Blades had a couple of big chances to expand their lead working on the power play, but star 20-year-old centre Tristen Robins got stoned on two shots from the left slot by Broncos 20-year-old netminder Isaac Poulter.

Tanner Molendyk makes a nice setup pass on the Blades first goal.

On the Blades second power-play chance of the opening frame, Robins broke through from that left slot spot one-timing home his 18^th of the season on a setup pass from captain Aidan De La Gorgendiere. Robins’ marker increased Saskatoon’s advantage to 2-0.

Swift Current responded with a big push back period in the second.

At the 4:21 mark of the second, the Broncos cut the Blades lead to 2-1, when Swift Current right-winger Caleb Wyrostok snapped home a power-play close in at the left side of the Saskatoon goal.

The Broncos followed up that tally putting on a lot of pressure in the Saskatoon zone looking for the equalizer holding a 12-9 edge in shots on goal in the frame.

Tristen Robins had a goal and two assists for the Blades.

Blades star 20-year-old netminder Nolan Maier kept the visitor at bay.

Saskatoon head coach Brennan Sonne said his squad turned the puck over a little too much in the second period, which allowed the Broncos to carry the momentum for much of that stanza.

“What you have to do is not turn it over through the neutral zone and you have to make sure that when there are turnovers in the offensive zone that your (defence) are on the D-side of their stretch guys,” said Sonne. “We started in second period turning it over, so that just feeds into what their strengths are, which is that transition stretch – the line rush four game.

“We were much more responsible in the third.”

Caleb Wyrostok had the Broncos lone goal on Saturday.

In the third, the Blades were a lot more smart decisions when they had the puck and clamped things down defensively.

That set the stage for Watterodt to come through for his first career WHL goal to put the Blades up 3-1.

Maier said the rest of the Blades enjoyed seeing Watterodt collect his milestone marker.

“When anyone scores but especially when it is their first goal and it is someone who is close to the city, it makes it that more important,” said Maier. “I think we were all ecstatic for him.

Nolan Maier, right, made 28 saves in goal for the Blades.

“We’re just really pumped up for him right now.”

Following Watterodt’s goal, Maier came up with a big glove save on Broncos left-winger Josh Filmon to help take away the hopes the visitors had about making a miracle rally.

Crnkovic proceeded to pot his second of the contest and 21^st of the season into an empty net with 4.5 seconds remaining in the third to round out Saskatoon’s 4-1 victory.

Robins had a pair of assists to go with his goal.

Broncos C Mathew Ward sets to make a pass in the offensive zone.

Maier stopped 28 shots to pick up the win in goal for the Blades (19-14-1-1). Isaac Poulter turned away 21 of 24 shots to take the setback in net for the Broncos (13-17-4-1).

For the Blades, their clashes with the Broncos on Friday and Saturday were their first games since falling 4-1 at home to the Edmonton Oil Kings on January 1. The Blades played four games in six nights after returning from their WHL Christmas break and that stretch wrapped up with the loss to Edmonton.

The Blades ended up going into a pause period due to a number of their players testing positive for COVID-19 along with most of the rest of the WHL’s member clubs. That caused the Blades to have another extended break.

Aiden De La Gorgendiere had an assist on Saturday.

Sonne said his team’s schedule over the last four weeks had been weird, but it gave his players a lot of jump when it came time to play games again.

“Coming into it, I think that there was just a lot of gusto,” said Sonne. “The guys were sick of practising and just wanted to play, so they were tired of listening to us and tired of our drills.

“It was good to get back to work. It was good to get back playing. That is why we spend all the time preparing and practising and getting ourselves ready is to play games.

“It is nice to do that. It is nice that there are fans here. We’re excited to get back to the grind.”

Broncos D Daylen Weigel shields the puck from two Blades.

The Broncos are slated to return to action on Tuesday when they host the Winnipeg Ice (7 p.m., Innovation Credit Union i-Plex).

The Blades are scheduled to return to action on Friday when they host the Medicine Hat Tigers (7 p.m., SaskTel Centre).

Maier said his Blades will be looking to build off the wins over the Broncos in the upcoming encounter against the Tigers.

“I think we just have to focus on our game,” said Maier. “We have a certain style of play that we need to keep up with.

The Blades celebrate their win over the Broncos on Saturday.

“If we start stringing along those kind of games together, it is going to be very positive.”

If you have any comments you would like to pass along about this post, feel free to email them to stankssports@gmail.com.

-------

If you like what you see here, you might want to donate to the cause to keep independent media like this blog going. Should you choose to help out, feel free to click on the DONATE button in the upper right corner. Thank you for stopping in.