Hughes rains on Raiders party in Blades season opening OT win

The Blades celebrate an OT winner from Ryan Hughes, centre.

    PRINCE ALBERT, Sask. – Ryan Hughes spoiled the championship banner raising party for the Prince Albert Raiders.

    On Friday night before a standing room crowd of 3,108 spectators at the 2,580 Art Hauser Centre, the speedy overage right-winger scored 17 seconds into overtime to lift the Saskatoon Blades to a 3-2 victory over their archrivals in the WHL regular season opening game for both sides.

    Hughes took a drop pass from overage defenceman Scott Walford in his own zone, zipped through the centre ice zone down the left wing, and roofed a shot to the top right corner of the Raiders goal past netminder Boston Bilous.

    Before Friday’s contest, the Raiders raised four banners for finishing first in the East Division, first in the WHL regular season standings, winning the WHL Eastern Conference title and the WHL championship last season.

Ryan Hughes starts his winning goal offensive rush.

    “Walford and I talked about that play there to go underneath and drop it,” said Hughes about his goal in the three-versus-three session. “I just saw that there was a forward skating backwards, and I kind of beat him wide.

    “I took a shot and it went in. It was nice.”

    Hughes said he was checking out his options as he came up the ice before deciding the situation was right to go coast-to-coast.

    “I kind of have to evaluate the puck on three on three,” said Hughes, who picked up assists on the Blades two regulation goals. “Once I got it and I saw I was skating against a forward, I just tried to get him wide.

    “I got a step on him and just took a shot.  Usually, I wouldn’t take that shot, but I’m lucky it went in.”

    Between the regular season and playoffs, the Blades fell in all seven of their visits to P.A. in the 2018-19 campaign. Saskatoon’s last win in “Hockey Town North” was by a 2-1 decision on March 16, 2018.

    Hughes was pleased his team could get that monkey off their collective backs.

    “It is a tough place to play for sure,” said Hughes. “It was tough tonight, and it was tough all year last year.

Scott Walford had the assist on the Blades OT winner.

    “It is nice for me to get my first win in this rink with the Blades.”

    The teams played through a feeling out type first period where the Raiders held a 6-4 edge in shots on goal.

    The Raiders broke through on the scoreboard at the 4:25 mark of the second period when import centre Aliaksei Protas blew home a shot from the top of the left faceoff circle to give the host side a 1-0 lead.

    The Blades evened things up a 1-1 just over two minutes later when right-winger Tristen Robins converted a backdoor feed on the power play from overage defenceman Nolan Kneen. The assist was Kneen’s 100th career regular season point in the WHL coming in his 250^th career game.

Aliaksei Protas had a goal for the Raiders on Friday.

    Shortly after Robins goal, Blades star netminder Nolan Maier robbed Raiders import centre Ilya Usau with a sprawling save. The scoring chance came after the Blades turned the puck over in their own zone.

    Blades head coach Mitch Love expected his team would experience some bumps in Friday’s opener.

    “It wasn’t pretty at times for probably both teams,” said Love, whose team is rated third in the CHL’s pre-season Top 10 rankings. “I’ve often said this weekend is a bit of an unpredictable event. You have a lot of kids playing in front of big crowds for the first time.

    “It is opening weekend and lots of family is in town. There are a lot of nerves. Obviously, (there was) the presentation here tonight for the defending champions.”
    Just past the midway point of the second, the Raiders went ahead 2-1 on a nifty play from rookie 17-year-old defenceman Landon Kosior. Kosior got the puck, pinched into the slot and sniped a shot past Maier.
    The tally was Kosior’s first career WHL goal.

Landon Kosior scored his first career WHL goal on Friday.

    The rivalry came to the forefront in a pronounced way in the third period. At the 2:37 mark of the third, Blades left-winger Randen Schmidt took on Raiders rookie defenceman Braydon Clark in a spirited fight.

    At the 7:28 mark of the third, two unexpected combatants went at it as Blades left-winger Kjell Kjemhus took on Raiders rookie defenceman Nolan Allan.

    After those two bouts, the Blades evened things up at 2-2 at the 10:11 mark of the third, when Walford fired home a floater through a screen from the point. That set the stage for Hughes’s heroics in the extra session.

    Bilous made 15 saves in goal for the Raiders. Maier turned away 18 shots in goal for the Blades.

    “It has been a long time since we found a win in this building,” said Love. “It is something our guys are pretty happy about tonight.”

    The only down part for the Blades was veteran centre Eric Florchuk left the game in the first period with an injury. Love said Florchuk will be re-evaluated when his club returns home to Saskatoon.

The Blade celebrate their OT win on Friday night.

    “I haven’t heard anything,” said Love. “He (Florchuk) seemed to be in good spirits after the game with his teammates, which is a good sign, but we will find out more in the morning.”

    The Blades and Raiders go at it again in Saskatoon on Saturday at 7 p.m. at the SaskTel Centre. That contest will be the home opener for the Blades.

    Hughes would like to see his team get after the Raiders right out of the gate.

    “Obviously, we need a faster start,” said Hughes. “I think that will be a big easier with our crowd behind us.

    “That is what we are going to look to do and see how it goes.”

Raiders captain Pachal inks NHL deal with Vegas

Brayden Pachal, left, signed an NHL contract on Friday.

    Prince Albert Raiders overage captain Brayden Pachal signed a three-year NHL entry-level contract with Vegas Golden Knights on Friday.

    Last season, Pachal appeared in 66 regular season games for the Raiders posting 15 goals, 36 assists and a plus-76 rating in the plus-minus department. In the WHL post-season, Pachal suited up in all 23 games the Raiders played recording one goal, seven assists and a plus-12 rating.

    With Pachal as the Raiders leader, Prince Albert finished first overall in the WHL last season with a 54-10-2-2 mark and captured the Ed Chynoweth Cup in the WHL playoffs to become league champions. That marked the first time the Raiders accomplished both those feats since the 1984-85 campaign.

    The Raiders won the Memorial Cup as CHL champions in 1984-85. At last year’s Memorial Cup in Halifax, N.S., the Raiders posted an 0-3 record against a tough field. Pachal had a goal and two assists in that event.

    Pachal began his WHL career in the 2015-16 campaign with the Victoria Royals, and he came to the Raiders in a trade on Jan. 9, 2017 in his second campaign.

    In 239 career regular season games split with the Royals and Raiders, Pachal had 26 goals, 72 assists and a plus-67 rating.

    He was in Prince Albert on Friday night to take part in the Raiders pre-game banner raising festivities. He will be heading to camp with the Knights AHL affiliate the Chicago Wolves.

    Pachal could still be eventually assigned to the Raiders for his overage campaign.

Love, Habscheid hit frenemies territory

Blades HC Mitch Love will be the HC of Team WHL.

    Mitch Love and Marc Habscheid are going to be frenemies.

    On Friday, the WHL and Hockey Canada announced that the 35-year-old Love, who is the head coach of the Saskatoon Blades, and the 56-year-old Habscheid, who is the head coach of the Prince Albert Raiders, will be working on the same staff together guiding the WHL team that will play in the annual Canada versus Russia series.

    Love will be the head coach of the WHL squad, while Habscheid will be an assistant coach along with Regina Pats head coach Dave Struch. Struch was a former Blades star forward, assistant coach and head coach.

    The WHL squad hosts Team Russia on Nov. 13 in Saskatoon and Nov. 14 in Prince Albert.

    Last season, the Raiders eliminated their archrivals in the Blades taking a best-of-seven second round series 4-2. During that series, Love and Habscheid fired verbal barbs at each other.

    Habscheid said the Blades players like to dive, while Love countered saying the Raiders like to go head hunting.

Raiders HC Marc Habscheid will be an AC for Team WHL.

    After that series, the Raiders moved on to win the Ed Chynoweth Cup as WHL champions.

Love chuckles about what happened in the post-season now.

    “Of course, we had some fun with each other last year through the media in that playoff series,” said Love during a media conference on Friday morning at the SaskTel Centre in Saskatoon. “The one thing that people maybe don’t understand is how much respect I have for Marc (Habscheid) and obviously Dave (Struch) himself.

    “Those are guys that have done a lot of things at this level along with international hockey, and I look up to (them). I’m real excited to get a chance to work with those guys, and I’m sure a lot of people are going to wonder about that relationship on that bench.”

    Love said he is looking forward to being the head coach of the WHL side, and believe it or not, he is pumped out the chance to work with Habscheid and Struch.

    “It is an extreme honour,” said Love. “I take a lot of pride in being a western Canadian boy working in the Western Hockey League whether as a player or now as a coach.

    “To get an opportunity from (WHL commissioner) Ron (Robison) along with Hockey Canada to be the head coach of this team is real exciting. I’m looking forward to working with the players that will be involved and obviously our staff her throughout the league.”

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

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