Raiders playoff opening win a Hauser crowd pleaser

Prince Albert downs Red Deer 4-1 in intense clash 

Braeden Cootes (#34) battles Jake Missura (#3).

PRINCE ALBERT, Sask. – It was a playoff victory that was a blast for the faithful of the Prince Albert Raiders.

On Friday, the Raiders downed the visiting Red Deer Rebels 4-1 in Game 1 of their first round WHL best-of-seven playoff series before a standing room crowd of 3,078 spectators at the storied and historic 2,580 seat Art Hauser Centre. The victory to open the post season was a sound one by the Raiders, who gradually pulled away in the contest.

The contest also was an intense one played between a pair of teams whose cultures are grounded in some good old school hockey values. The contest had physical moments where both sides will likely have to agree to disagree on how they viewed those instances.

Braeden Cootes had two goals and an assist for the Raiders.

The Raiders started the night entering the ice to Airbourne’s “Live It Up” drawing a call back to their last WHL championship winning campaign in 2018-19. That tune was the squad’s entrance song for that campaign.

The host side kept the pre-game nods to their past coming by having Carole Ring come out to sing the national anthem. Ring has lifetime links to the Raiders being best known for being a longtime billet mom for a number of the club’s players and serving for a time as the team’s secretary way back in the early 1980s.

During the opening faceoff, both teams tried to set the tone as the starting centres in Raiders 20-year-old Aiden Oiring and Czech import Matej Mikes, who turned 19 in February, butted into each other before referee Josh Grimm could drop the puck.

Braeden Cootes had plus-two rating in the plus-minus department.

The contest’s next big moment was one of the spots of the night the Raiders fans weren’t happy with. About 90 seconds into the first period, Raiders breakout star centre Max Heise was battling for the puck in the right corner boards of the Prince Albert zone against Rebels import defenceman Jiri Kamas. As the puck battle was going on, Heise got slammed awkwardly into the boards by Rebels centre Owen DeWitt, who jetted into the hit with speed.

Heise fell down to the ice and was helped to the dressing room and didn’t return to the contest. That meant the Raiders had to play without the man that led the squad with 29 goals during the regular season and finished with 63 points in 63 regular season contests. The officials didn’t call any penalties on the play causing the moment to be a missed potential charging call on DeWitt.

Michal Orsulak stopped 22 shots in goal for the Raiders.

The Raiders proceeded to push on after that development.

With 5:17 remaining in the first, they broke through on the scoreboard while working on the power play. Star centre Braeden Cootes got the puck at the top of the right faceoff circle and fired a blast past Rebels star 18-year-old rookie netminder Matthew Kondro to give the host side a 1-0 edge.

About a minute later, a moment happened that the Rebels weren’t happy about. Rebels right-winger Patrick Sopiarz was coming out of his zone with the puck, when he got hit knee-to-knee by Raiders defenceman Linden Burrett.

The collision happened right in front of the Red Deer bench, and most of the Rebels players were up in arms voicing their displeasure to the officials. The officials didn’t call any penalties on the collision making the moment another missed call, but they did give an unrelated tripping minor to Raiders sophomore right-winger Riley Boychuk just about 15 seconds later.

Matthew Kondro made 35 saves in net for the Rebels.

Sopiarz ended up being alright after the hit by Burrett and was out to play on the Red Deer power-play after Boychuk took his tripping minor.

Between those two physical moments in the opening frame, both teams locked into focusing on playing their systems in transitioning the puck up ice and trying to create turnovers forechecking in the offensive zone.

Just 2:03 into the second period, the Raiders pushed their lead out to 2-0 off a positive bounce goal by star defenceman Daxon Rudolph. Rudolph circled around behind the Red Deer net with the puck coming out on the left side of the goal. He slid a shot into the crease of the Rebels net and had the puck deflect off Kondro into the goal to give the hosts their two-goal edge.

Outside of that moment, Kondro had an outstanding period making 19 saves as the Rebels were outshot 20-7 in the second period. One of his best stops came late in the frame on a close in screen shot opportunity by Boychuk.

Daxon Rudolph celebrates scoring for the Raiders.

The physical play continued in the second too. Before the midway part of the stanza, Raiders captain Justice Christensen hammered Rebels 20-year-old defenceman Aleksey Chichkin into the Prince Albert bench. That drew a huge roar from the Raiders faithful.

Later on in the frame, Raiders 17-year-old right-winger Jonah Sivertson delivered a crowd-pleasing hit on Rebels 17-year-old left-winger Cameron Kuzma.

During the second period, Raiders star import netminder Michal Orsulak, who turned 18 in early January, had to be sharp even if he wasn’t as busy as Kondro. With just over 10 minutes remaining in the second, the Rebels sprung 17-year-old right-winger Kalder Varga into the Prince Albert zone on a breakaway. Varga was stoned by Orsulak.

Poul Andersen scored for the Rebels on Friday.

In the third, the Rebels pushed back, and they broke through on the scoreboard at the 7:35 mark of the frame with a positive bounce goal on the power play. Rebels left-winger Poul Andersen shot a puck from the left side boards in the Prince Albert zone, and the puck deflected off a Raiders defenceman into the Prince Albert goal cut the host side’s lead to 2-1.

The Raiders ensured the Rebels wouldn’t complete the comeback. With 9:02 remaining in the third, Cootes got the puck on a rush into the Red Deer zone, and he fired home his second of the contest from just under the right faceoff dot to give the Raiders a 3-1 advantage.

Right after scoring that goal, Cootes got tangled up with Rebels 17-year-old defenceman Jake Missura causing a scrum to develop. The officials promptly got the players on both sides untangled and sent to their respective benches.

Brock Cripps had the Raiders fourth goal on Friday.

With 3:14 remaining in the third, Cootes gave the puck to Raiders skilled 16-year-old rookie defenceman Brock Cripps with a slick pass just inside the Red Deer zone. Cripps skated to the top of the right faceoff circle and drove home a shot to round out the final 4-1 score in favour of the host side.

An oddity proceeded to occur with 28.4 seconds remaining in the third as Raiders import left-winger Alisher Sarkenov and Rebels 20-year-old centre Tyson Yaremko got tangled up and had a holding match. That ultimately was the end of the extracurricular activities for the night.

At the final buzzer, both sides made a point to give a quiet nod of respect to each other and skated away from each other to their respective ends.

When the dust was settled, Orsulak had stopped 22 shots to pick up his first career WHL post-season win in goal for the Raiders. Kondro turned away 35 shots to take the setback in net for the Rebels.

The Raiders salute their faithful at the Art Hauser Centre.

Both sides will go at it in Game 2 of the series on Saturday at 7 p.m. at the Art Hauser Centre. While Friday’s Game 1 had some good intensity, one can expect that factor to keep increasing as the series goes on.

As for the Raiders faithful, they will be hoping to see another crowd pleaser in Game 2 where, of course, the home side prevails once again.

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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