Pats’ Bedard sinks Raiders

Phenom 16-year-old centre nets winner 24 seconds into OT

Connor Bedard, left, enjoys scoring the Pats OT winner.

PRINCE ALBERT, Sask. – Connor Bedard might have become public enemy number one in “Hockey Town North.”

On Friday night, the 16-year-old phenom centre netted the winning goal 24 seconds into overtime to deliver his Regina Pats to a 5-4 WHL regular season victory over the host Prince Albert Raiders. Following the goal, Bedard gave off a bit of a swagger like celebration to the dislike of the standing room crowd of 2,962 spectators at the 2,580 seat Art Hauser Centre.

Following the contest, Raiders head coach Marc Habscheid wasn’t happy his squad lost track of Bedard in the extra session along with committing a number of other errors in the contest.

The Raiders won the faceoff to start overtime and got the puck deep into the offensive zone. At that point, the puck was turned over on a bad pass and Bedard streaked coast-to-coast down the right wing with the puck on a two-on-one rush.

Connor Bedard speeds down the ice on his winning goal rush.

Bedard skated in close to the Prince Albert net and roofed the winner and his 30^th tally of the season to the top left corner of the goal.

“It was disappointing,” said Habscheid. “We got caught on the wrong side of the puck.

“We talked about when he is out there. You have to be careful. You have to be on the right side of the puck, and we got caught on the wrong side to create a two-on-one with a 16-year-old who is a pretty good player.

“It ended up in our net not surprising, but it didn’t start there. It started in their end. We got a little bit greedy, and we paid for it.”

Connor Bedard picked up an assist on the Pats third period goal.

The Raiders entered the third period holding a 4-3 advantage but weren’t able to close out the contest defensively. With 4:31 remaining in the third, Bedard rushed down the right wing and took a shot on goal from a bad angle.

The shot rebounded to the front of the Prince Albert goal to Pats centre Cole Carrier. Carrier popped home his 14^th of the season for the equalizer to make the score 4-4.

The fact that Pats evened the score on a juicy rebound goal on top of losing track of Bedard in overtime made the setback that much more frustrating for the Raiders.

“I thought we played hard for most of the game,” said Raiders captain Reece Vitelli. “It was tough to let that one slip.”

Cole Carrier scored in the third period to force overtime.

The Raiders got out to a strong start scoring 69 seconds into the first period. Raiders left-winger Sloan Stanick jetted into the offensive zone down the right wing and slipped a pass across the front of the Regina goal to linemate Cale Sanders, who popped home his 11^th of the season.

The Pats evened things up at 1-1 just under five minutes later when defenceman Layton Feist rushed with the puck coast-to-coast down the right wing and wired home a shot to the top left corner of the Prince Albert goal. Feist’s tally was off Regina’s first shot on goal of the contest.

With 5:46 remaining in the opening frame, the Raiders jumped back in front 2-1, when right-winger Carson Latimer scored off a net scramble.

Landon Kosior scored twice on the power play for the Raiders.

The Pats came out with all sorts of fire to start the second period and jumped ahead 3-2 at the 7:02 mark of the frame with goals from Borya Valis and Tanner Howe. Valis tallied with the teams playing four-versus-four hockey, while Howe, who is 16-year-old left-winger from Prince Albert, scored with a point shot with the teams playing at even strength.

Before the second period ended, the Raiders jumped back in front 4-3 with a pair of power-play goals coming off the stick of offensive-defenceman Landon Kosior. Kosior drove home both his goals from the left slot while playing left wing.

He converted tick-tack-toe passing plays on both tallies with the first marker coming off a five-on-three situation and the second goal on a five-on-four advantage.

Tikhon Chaika made 31 saves in goal for the Raiders.

The five-on-three situation was created when Bedard received a minor penalty for checking from behind with a Pats player already in the penalty box.

Kosior said his Raiders felt they were in a good spot after he netted his power-play goals.

“I think after those we knew we were up, so we all kind of thought we’d play defence and we had a good chance of winning,” said Kosior. “It was just unfortunate that we weren’t able to pull through with it.”

Near the start of the third period, Raiders right-winger Carson Latimer had a golden chance to net and insurance goal for the host side, but he was turned away by Pats netminder Drew Sim.

Carson Latimer had a goal for the Raiders on Friday.

That set the stage for the Pats to rally for the overtime victory.

Tikhon Chaika turned away 31 shots to take the extra time setback in goal for the Raiders (17-25-2-1). Sim stopped 22 shots to pick up the win in net for the Pats (18-23-1-1).

The Pats were without head coach and general manager John Paddock for a second straight game for undisclosed reasons. Assistant coach Brad Herauf ran the Pats bench as head coach.

The Raiders return to action on Saturday when they host the Moose Jaw Warriors (7 p.m., Art Hauser Centre).

The Pats are back at it on Monday when they host the Swift Current Broncos (2 p.m., Brandt Centre).

The Pats celebrate their overtime victory on Friday.

When the Raiders get back at it against the Warriors, Kosior said the focus will be to keep the play in Moose Jaw’s end of the rink.

“I think the biggest thing is just playing some time in their zone,” said Kosior. “I thought in the third period the Pats kind of were in our zone more than we were in theirs.

“We just have to generate momentum by being in their zone.”

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