Blades power play and penalty kill heat up

Rebels need to reset and get back on task

The Blades celebrate a power-play goal from Egor Sidorov (#19).

The Saskatoon Blades power play and penalty kill is catching fire, and it could aid them in their quest to try and achieve the greatest playoff series comeback in team history.

The Red Deer Rebels are looking to reset and get back on task playing with a sound structure that has them to within one win of the WHL’s Eastern Conference Championships Series.

The two clubs go at it on Sunday at 2 p.m. local time at the Peavey Mart Centrium in Red Deer for Game 6 of their WHL Eastern Conference semifinal series. The Rebels hold a 3-2 lead in the best-of-seven set.

Red Deer opened by winning the first three games against the Blades to get one win away from advancing to the Eastern Conference Championship Series. Saskatoon won the last two contests to get two wins away from being just the third team in WHL history to come back and win a best-of-seven series 4-3 after losing the first three games of the set.

Dating back to the WHL’s start in 1966-67, only two teams have rallied back to win a best-of-seven series having trailed the set 3-0. The Spokane Chiefs, who were guided by Mike Babcock as head coach, trailed the Portland Winterhawks 3-0 before rallying to take a first round series 4-3 in 1996. The Kelowna Rockets fell behind the Seattle Thunderbirds 3-0 in 2013 before rallying back to claim that first round series 4-3.

The Blades have been able to change the complexion of the series thanks to the play of their power play and penalty killing units over the past two games. Saskatoon has scored on 4-of-8 power play chances and allowed the Rebels to score on 1-of-6 chances on the man advantage. The Blades have successfully killed off the Rebels last five consecutive power-play opportunities.

The Rebels celebrate a goal from Kai Uchacz (#19).

In Game 4 on Wednesday in Red Deer, the Blades only allowed one power-play goal coming off the stick of Rebels star centre Kai Uchacz at the 6:27 mark of the first period. Red Deer was working on at five-minute power play after Blades gritty right-winger Justin Lies was given a major penalty and a game misconduct for delivering a head shot to Rebels star left-winger Kalan Lind, who turned 18-years-old in January.

While Uchacz was able to score, the Blades were still pretty strong on that kill.

The Rebels were able to exit the first period with a 2-0 advantage after Uchacz scored at even strength. Red Deer had a huge opportunity to put Saskatoon away when Blades star left-winger Brandon Lisowsky was given a double minor for high-sticking at the 6:14 mark of the second.

The Blades gained some traction successfully killing off that double minor. A short time after that kill, the Blades got more traction going on the power play themselves, and captain Aidan De La Gorgendiere, who is a star offensive-defenceman, scored his first goal off the post-season on the man advantage to cut the Rebels lead to 2-1.

That set the stage for the Blades to roll off three straight goals in a span of four minutes and three second in the third to pull out a 4-2 victory.

Egor Sidorov is finding success on the power play for the Blades.

In Game 5 of the series on Friday in Saskatoon, the Blades took advantage of the Rebels taking some undisciplined penalties going 3-for-6 on the power play and killing off all three Red Deer power-play chances to pull out a 6-3 victory. Star import right-winger Egor Sidorov scored twice on the power play and De La Gorgendiere scored the winner on a chance with the man advantage.

During the regular season, the Blades power play and penalty killing units were among the best in the WHL. The Blades had the fourth best power play in the league converting on 73-of-265 chances for a 27.5 per cent success rate, and they had the third best penalty killing unit on the circuit killing off 202-of-245 opposition power-play opportunities for an 82.4 per cent success rate.

If the Blades special teams units stay hot, it will greatly help their chances of winning Game 6 and forcing a series deciding Game 7, which is set for Tuesday at 7 p.m. at the SaskTel Centre if needed.

The Rebels, on the other hand, need to get back to what they were doing well when they took a 3-0 lead in the series. During those first three games, the Rebels were sound in their structural play along with being poised, businesslike and hard working.

Kai Uchacz is piling up goals for the Rebels.

Red Deer clogged up the centre ice zone taking away the Blades tendency to go for stretch passes. In the defensive zone, the Rebels played with poise and had good spacing. The Blades players were often kept to the outside and seemed to second guess what they wanted to do when it came time to pass the puck.

In the offensive zone, the Rebels set up a strong forecheck that kept the Blades pinned for numerous stretches in their own zone. When the Rebels had the puck in the offensive zone, they moved it around with confidence and shot it with purpose once it was in a prime scoring area.

Red Deer was sound with systems play taking a 2-0 lead in the first period in Game 4. While the Blades had some push back in second period to cut the Rebels lead to 2-1, the Red Deer side was just 20 minutes from closing out the series going into the second intermission.

The Rebels seemed to unravel after the Blades surged ahead to take the contest 4-2 in the third and visibly showed frustration at times after going down by two goals. In Game 5, the Rebels were too occupied with trying to be physical, and that resulted in undisciplined penalties that allowed the Blades to take the game.

Aidan De La Gorgendiere has two post-season power-play goals.

It seemed like the Rebels got off track after Lind went down to injury. Lind is very popular amongst his teammates and is a fan favourite of the community of Red Deer.

The Rebels appeared to want to show their romantic “all heart” characteristic to try and pull out a win for their fallen teammate. Emotion can be a thing that speeds a team up and allows club to achieve new levels of greatness.

Emotion can also be a thing that causes a team to try too hard and lose composure. At that point, emotion can be a determent to a team, and that seems to be the case the Rebels find themselves in.

The Rebels also have to be concerned about their situation in goal too. 

In their first nine games in the WHL Playoffs, Kyle Kelsey posted stellar numbers with a 7-2 record, a 1.93 goals against average, a .928 save percentage and one shutout.

In the third period of Game 4, he allowed three goals on seven shots as the Blades surged to victory. Kelsey started Game 5 and was pulled with 1:57 remaining in the opening frame after allowing three goals on seven shots. Chase Coward played the rest of the way in relief and ultimate took the loss in net.

Ben King is one of the Rebels top offensive players.

The Blades were without Lies for Game 5, because he was suspended by the WHL for his head shot on Lind. On Saturday, the WHL finalized Lies’ suspension at three games. If the Blades are able to make the Eastern Conference Championship Series, Lies would be eligible to return for Game 1 of that set.

The Lies suspension marked only the second time in the 2022-23 campaign in the regular season and playoffs that the Blades have had a player get suspended.

Also on Saturday, the Rebels learned that they will be without import right-winger Frantisek Formanek due to a one-game suspension under supplemental discipline. In Game 5, Formanek was giving a boarding minor penalty at the 7:21 mark of the first period.

Formanek hit Blades 20-year-old defenceman Blake Gustafson from behind, and Gustafson was able to prevent himself from making a hard crash into the boards. The Blades sent in video to the WHL office asking for supplemental discipline as this was a dangerous play.

Originally, it was expected that this would be a tight series going in between the Blades and Rebels. The Blades finished fourth in the overall WHL regular season standings with a 48-15-4-1 record and were rated 10^th in the final CHL Top 10 Rankings. The Rebels finished fifth in the overall WHL standings and topped the Central Division with a 43-19-3-3 mark.

The Blades and Rebels engage in activity after the whistle.

Taking an unconventional route, it has become a tight series. The next chapter and potentially closing chapter of this drama will play out on Sunday.

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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