Friday 4 February 2022

Blades’ power play drills Oil Kings in romp

Saskatoon rolls to 6-1 win over CHL’s second ranked team

The Blades enjoy an Aidan De La Gorgendiere power-play goal.
The Saskatoon Blades highly rated power-play unit took the Edmonton Oil Kings highly rated penalty killing unit out to the woodshed.

Entering play Friday, the Blades power play was rated second in the WHL, while the Oil Kings had the second best penalty killing unit on the circuit. Unfortunately for the Oil Kings, the Blades power-play unit proved to be too much to handle.

The Blades cashed in on 3-of-7 power-play chances as they rolled to a 6-1 victory over the Oil Kings in a WHL regular season clash that sent the 2,407 spectators at the SaskTel Centre home happy.

Rhett Rhinehart had the Blades first goal on Friday.
The Oil Kings are rated second in the CHL’s Top 10 rankings, but the Blades have split their four head-to-head meetings with the Edmonton side this season.

Saskatoon has an overtime win against Edmonton to go with Friday’s regulation romp, while the Oil Kings have prevailed in two regulation encounters.

The Blades opened the game’s scoring at the 10:11 mark of the opening frame on an unassuming situation. Saskatoon veteran defenceman Charlie Wright entered the offensive zone on a rush down the left wing.

Wright’s defensive partner in 20-year-old Rhett Rhinehart jumped up in the play to create a two-on-one rush. Wright passed the puck across the front of the Edmonton goal to Rhinehart, who buried his fifth goal of the season on a perfectly executed play.

Kyle Crnkovic leads the WHL in scoring with 63 points.
Before the opening frame ended, the Blade extended their lead to 2-0 scoring their first of three power-play goals on the night. On a rush into the offensive zone, centre Jayden Wiens came down the right wing with the puck and hit left-winger Kyle Crnkovic with a centering pass.

Crnkovic took a couple of strides with the puck and passed it back to Wiens at the right side of the Edmonton goal. Wiens popped his 15th of the season into an empty cage to give the Blades their two-goal edge.

The Oil Kings held a 16-6 edge in shots on goal over the opening 20 minutes, but they were held at bay by Blades overage star netminder Nolan Maier.

Aidan De La Gorgendiere had a goal and two assists on Friday.
The Oil Kings got some traction at the 6:24 mark of the second when captain Jake Neighbours snapped home a point shot to cut Saskatoon’s lead to 2-1.

Near the end of the second, the wheels fell off the wagon for the Oil Kings as the Blades scored three times – including twice on the power play - in the final 3:24 of the frame to surge their advantage out to 5-1.

The surge started with Crnkovic firing home a power-play goal from the slot through a screen shortly after an offensive zone faceoff to put the Blades up 3-1.

With 72 seconds remaining in the second, the Blades scored on an even-strength rush. Blades left-winger Vaughn Watterodt zipped down the right wing and delivered a backhanded pass across the front of the Edmonton goal to linemate Kyren Gronick at the left side of the Oil Kings net.

Tristen Robins had three assists for the Blades on Friday.
Gronick popped his sixth of the season to push the Blades lead out to 4-1.

The surge concluded with 29.2 seconds remaining in the second when captain Aidan De La Gorgendiere slipped home a power-play goal from the point to give the Blades a 5-1 advantage. De La Gorgendiere’s tally was the Blades third power-play goal of the contest.

Edmonton pulled starting star netminder Sebastian Cossa following the conclusion of the second period. He turned away 10-of-15 shots sent his way to take the loss in goal for the Oil Kings, who fell to 30-11-2-1.

The Blades celebrate a goal from Tyler Parr (#20).
Kolby Hay played the third in relief for the Oil Kings allowing a goal on the one shot he faced in the frame.

Blades rookie right-winger Tyler Parr beat Hay with a long rage on ice shot from the front of the Edmonton goal at the 11:32 mark of the third.

Down 6-1, the Oil Kings showed their frustration. With 5:15 remaining in the third, Neighbours went after Wiens following a neutral zone faceoff. That action started a scrum, but the scrum was de-escalated quickly as the officials swiftly and smartly jumped in.

Watterodt got the only penalty for the Blades in a scrum with a roughing minor. Neighbours made an early trip to the showers after getting roughing and unsportsmanlike conduct minors and a 10-minute misconduct.

Blades C Jayden Wiens tangles with Oil Kings LW Jake Neighbours. 
While the Oil Kings are near the top of the standings in the WHL, they are the second most penalized team on the circuit piling up 607 minutes in the sin bin. Going forward, the Oil Kings have to do a better job of finding a way to stay out of the penalty box, because that is their Achilles heel.

The Blades have come out of Friday’s game having great confidence on their power play. On the season, the Blades have scored 50 goals on 172 power plays for a 29.1 per cent success rate.

Saskatoon’s power play was so good on Friday it knocked the Oil Kings penalty kill from second to fourth best in the league. The Oil Kings have killed of 169-of-206 opposition power plays for an 82 per cent success rate on the season.

Nolan Maier earned his 110th career regular season win on Friday.
Maier stopped 38 shots to pick up the win in goal for the Blades, who improved to 23-15-1-1 having won six of their last seven games. The Yorkton, Sask., product now has 110 career regular season victories in his WHL career, and he became the ninth netminder in league history to hit that milestone.

Maier is now 10 wins away from equaling the WHL’s all-time career regular season wins record of 120 victories held jointly by Corey Hirsch and Tyson Sexsmith. Hirsch picked up his 120 victories playing four seasons with the Kamloops Blazers from 1988 to 1992.

Sexsmith collected his 120 wins over five seasons with the Vancouver Giants from 2005 to 2009. He also had one non-decision relief appearance for the Medicine Hat Tigers late in the 2004-05 campaign.

Crnkovic and De La Gorgendiere each had a pair of assists to go with the single goals they each picked up for respective three-point nights. Crnkovic continues to lead the WHL in scoring having piled up 26 goals and 37 assists for 63 points appearing in all of the Blades 40 games.

The Blades celebrate their win on Friday night.
Blades 20-year-old star centre Tristen Robins picked up three assists in the win. He sits fifth in the WHL scoring race with 20 goals and 36 assists for 56 points in 38 appearances this season.

The Oil Kings are back in action on Saturday when they travel to Prince Albert to take on the Raiders (7 p.m., Art Hauser Centre).

The Blades also get back it on Saturday when they host the Red Deer Rebels (7 p.m., SaskTel Centre).

With the success that the Blades have had on the power play this season, they continue to show they can be a handful for any team in the WHL including clubs that sit near or at the top of the standings.

“Bridge City Bunch” honours Lazaruk for 2,000th call

The Blades present Les Lazaruk a framed jersey for his 2,000th call.
The Saskatoon Blades saluted veteran play-by-play voice Les Lazaruk for joining the 2,000 club.

On Wednesday, Lazaruk call his 2,000th game as the Blades play-by-play voice when they downed the Pats in Regina 5-4 at the Brandt Centre.

Before the Blades dumped the powerhouse Edmonton Oil Kings 6-1 on Friday night at the SaskTel Centre, the Blades honoured Lazaruk in a pre-game ceremony. Lazaruk was given a loud round of cheers when he was made his way to centre ice and was introduced to the 2,407 spectators in attendance.

Following Lazaruk’s introduction, the Blades played a video just over six minutes in length of former Blades players, former Blades coaches and broadcasters from around the WHL and in the professional ranks congratulating him on his 2,000th call. The video can be found on the Blades social media channels.

Former players that wished him well included Chase Wouters, Nelson Nogier and Nick Zajac. Former coaches that passed upbeat on messages to Lazaruk included Lorne Molleken and Mitch Love.

Les Lazaruk, second from right, is pictured with his framed jersey.
The broadcasters that gave their congratulations included Claire Hanna of TSN, Peter Loubardias, of TheFan 960 in Calgary and iconic Medicine Hat Tigers play-by-play voice Bob Ridley, who has called 4,021 Tigers games.

After the video was played, the Blades presented Lazaruk with a large framed team jersey with Lazaruk’s name bar and the number 2,000 stitched on the back.

During the win over the Oil Kings, the Blades would play one of Lazaruk’s trademark energetic goal calls before playing the team’s goal song.

Lazaruk began calling Blades games at the start of the 1994-95 season after spending over a decade working in Winnipeg, which included 10-and-a-half years hosting the hour long pre-game and post-game shows of the original Winnipeg Jets NHL broadcast for CJOB radio.

During his time calling games in the WHL, Lazaruk has built a reputation for being one of the best in the business. He also brings a great professionalism and class to his trade.

Lazaruk has become so closely branded with Blades broadcasts you almost couldn’t imagine another person making those calls.

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