Warriors’ skill opportunistic in OT win over Blades

Saskatoon holds 43-17 edge in shots on goal in loss

The Warriors celebrate an OT winner from Maximus Wanner, left.

The Moose Jaw Warriors took a page out of the script of the 2000s era Calgary Flames of Jarome Iginla and Miikka Kiprusoff when it came to winning a hockey game.

That meant the script for victory required your goaltender to make an extraordinary amount of saves, while a skilled guy pumped in some timely offence. Facing the host Saskatoon Blades on Wednesday night at the SaskTel Centre, the Warriors received a 39 save performance from star overage netminder Connor Ungar and a four point night from star right-winger Atley Calvert, who had two goals and two assists, en route to posting a 5-4 overtime victory.

Just 45 seconds into a three-versus-three overtime session, the Warriors burst into the Saskatoon zone on a rush. Warriors star centre Brayden Yager brought the puck in over the blue-line and made a drop pass to Calvert.

Atley Calvert had two goals and two assists for the Warriors.

Calvert had the puck at the point and fed a smart pass to offensive-defenceman Maximus Wanner, who was deep down the left wing alone in the Saskatoon zone. Wanner skated in on the Saskatoon goal, waited for Blades netminder Ethan Chadwick to start going down in the butterfly, and roofed home the winner over Chadwick’s shoulder on the short side of the net to stun most of the 2,929 spectators in attendance.

While the Warriors were outshot 43-17 in the contest, they inexplicably found a way to run their winning streak to four straight games improving to 28-14-0-2. With the extra time setback, the Blades record moved to 27-9-3-1 to sit equal with the Warriors 58 standings points.

The Warriors currently sit third overall in the WHL’s Eastern Conference due to having more wins than the Blades, but Saskatoon has four games in hand on Moose Jaw.

Connor Ungar makes one of his 39 saves for the Warriors.

Wednesday’s encounter proved to be head scratcher for Blades supporters. After the game’s opening 20 minutes, the Blades looked like they would bounce back from a 3-1 setback they sustained one night earlier against the Warriors at the Moose Jaw Events Centre in Moose Jaw.

The Blades came flying out of the gate. They opened the game’s scoring at the 4:31 mark of the first period, when Belarusian import right-winger Egor Sidorov popped home a rebound at the right side of the Moose Jaw goal from a shot taken by Blades standout defenceman Tanner Molendyk.

The tally marked the sixth goal in four games for Sidorov.

The Blades celebrate a first period goal from Egor Sidorov (#19).

The Blades held a 7-0 edge in shots on goal 10 minutes into the first and exited the frame with a 12-4 advantage in that department.

In the second frame, both sides decided to dial things back to the run-and-gun era of the 1980s, which seemed to play to the Warriors advantage.

Calvert scored on his team’s sixth shot of the contest deflecting a point blast from star centre Ryder Korczak to even the score at 1-1 at the 6:52 mark of the second. Just 10 seconds later, Blades star left-winger Conner Roulette put the Blades back ahead 2-1 gathering a loose puck and popping it into an empty net after Ungar and Warriors defenceman Lucas Brenton mishandled a shoot in.

Conner Roulette netted a pair of goals for the Blades.

The visitors quickly responded with a pair of goals to go ahead 3-2 with 10:03 remaining in the second period with tallies coming off the sticks of Ryder Korczak and Jagger Firkus on the Warriors seventh and eighth respective shots of the contest. Calvert picked up his first helper of the contest on Korczak’s tally.

The Blades proceeded to pull starting netminder Austin Elliott after Moose Jaw’s third goal. Elliott stopped 5-of-8 shots fired his way. Chadwick turned away 7-of-9 shots in relief in being credited with the extra time setback.

Just 3:24 after Chadwick entered the contest, he was beaten by a shot that accounted for Calvert’s second tally of the contest, with this one coming on a Moose Jaw power play to increase the Warriors advantage to 4-2. Calvert corralled the puck after it changed direction on a crazy bounce right to him and the break allowed him to score into an empty cage.

The Blades work frantically to defend their net.

With 1:52 remaining in the second, the Blades got a big traction goal with Roulette’s second of the contest to cut the Warriors lead to 4-3.

In the third, the Blades threw everything at the Moose Jaw net including the kitchen sink holding a 16-2 edge in shots on goal for the frame. The hosts were only able to beat Ungar once to force a 4-4 tie and ultimately overtime.

With 9:16 remaining in the third, Blades overage captain and offensive-defenceman Aidan De La Gorgendiere wired a point shot on goal that Ungar stopped but also produced a juicy rebound jetting out to the left side of the Moose Jaw net. Blades star centre Trevor Wong collected the rebound and popped home the equalizer into an empty cage.

The Warriors work frantically to keep the puck out of their goal.

That set the stage for the Warriors to pull out victory in overtime. Calvert hit a milestone as the four-point night allowed him to surpass 100 career points in regular season play. In 146 regular season games all with the Warriors, Calvert has 43 goals and 59 assists for 102 points.

When the dust settled, the Blades had to be wondering how they didn’t come out with a win on Wednesday. They are now left to turn the page before returning to action on Friday when they host their archrivals the 15-24-3 Prince Albert Raiders (7 p.m., SaskTel Centre).

In that contest, the Blades will be doing a promotion for the second straight year where they will play as the Saskatoon Bananas and will sell Saskatoon Bananas merchandise as part of the promotion. Fans enjoyed the comedy of the promotion when the Blades held it last season on April 1, 2022 and posted a 4-1 victory over the Warriors.

The Warriors celebrate their OT win on Wednesday.

The Warriors get back at it when they travel to Winnipeg to take on the WHL leading 31-5-1 Ice twice. The Warriors and Ice will go at it on 7 p.m. local time on Saturday and 4 p.m. local time on Sunday at the Wayne Fleming Arena.

Moose Jaw took both of their earlier meetings with Winnipeg this season on home ice. In the upcoming encounters with Winnipeg, the Warriors would prefer not to go the Iginla/Kiprusoff era of the NHL’s Flames to pull out victory, but they know they are capable of going that route if they have to.

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Blades rock Rebels 5-2 in bounce back win

Tristen Robins had a pair of goals and an assist on Saturday.

It proved to be no problem at all for the Saskatoon Blades to get a bounce back win against a team that had won seven in a row.

On Saturday night, the Blades rolled off a 5-2 WHL regular season victory over the visiting Red Deer Rebels to the delight of 3,999 spectators in attendance at the SaskTel Centre. The Rebels, who have been one of the WHL’s top teams this season, entered Saturday’s clash riding a seven game win streak.

The Blades went into the encounter having dropped a 4-3 heartbreaker in overtime at home one night earlier to the WHL East Division leading Winnipeg Ice.

The Blades celebrate a goal from Noah Boyko.

After falling to the Ice, the response by “the Bridge City Bunch” against the Rebels was a welcome one. Actually, Blades head coach Brennan Sonne appreciated how his club took on the Rebels’ traditionally tough and physical style of play.

“My favourite part of tonight was that we stayed in the battle,” said Sonne. “Red Deer is a big, strong, physical team.

“They can be intimidating. Instead of shying away from that, I thought we engaged with it, which is awesome from our group. As kind of a younger team and a smaller team, we engaged in that battle pretty much the whole time, so I was really pleased with that.”

The Rebels came out of the gates holding a 7-2 edge in shots on goal before the Blades hit top gear.

With 6:19 remaining in the first, the Blades broke through on the scoreboard, when right-winger Noah Boyko deflected home a point shot by defenceman Rhett Rhinehart to give the host side a 1-0 lead.

Rhett Rhinehart scored for the Blades on the power play.

About two-and-a-half minutes later, Rhinehart pushed the Blades advantage out to 2-0 floating home a point shot through a screen to the top left corner of the Red Deer goal with the hosts working on a power play.

The Blades weren’t done on the scoreboard there. With 54.6 seconds remaining in the first, Blades overage star centre Tristen Robins scored on a one-timer off a set up pass from sophomore defenceman Tanner Molendyk. The puck from Robins’ shot hit Rebels netminder Chase Coward, bounced high into the air and floated over top the puck stopper into the Red Deer goal giving the Blades a 3-0 lead.

Vaughn Watterodt, right, drives a shot on goal for the Blades. 

“We’ve kind of eased into games as of late,” said Sonne. “The first five minutes or so we’ve just kind of not been right into it right away.

“It has been a point of emphasis for us. Once we got our legs under us a little bit, and we started spending some offensive zone time I thought we just kind of got rolling and got some pucks to the net and did some good things.

“Those offensive zone shifts really helped.”

The only down part for the Blades in the opening 20 minutes was fact veteran 18-year-old centre Trevor Wong went down with the team holding a 2-0 edge. Wong went down after taking a cross check in the mid-section from Rebels import defenceman Christoffer Sedoff after making a pass in the offensive zone.

Tristen Robins scored a key power-play goal in the second period.

No penalty was called on the play.

The injury brought an end to Wong’s streak or recording a point in 11 consecutive games. During that streak, Wong piled up 17 points coming on eight goals and nine assists.

The Blades kept coming in the second period. Working on the power play, Robins blasted down the left-wing and put home his second of the contest fooling Coward on a deke move to give Saskatoon a 4-0 edge at the 5:11 mark of the second frame.

Coward was pulled after that tally having stopped 9-of-13 shots sent his way to take the loss in goal for the Rebels (36-16-2-1). Connor Ungar turned away 14-of-15 shots playing the rest of the way in relief for the Rebels.

Vaughn Watterodt tallied to give the Blades a 5-0 lead.

Just over five minutes later, the Blades went ahead 5-0 on a goal from left-winger Vaughn Watterodt, whose bad angle shot handcuffed Ungar and went into the Red Deer goal.

Robins said it was big for his squad to have a strong start to the second period to follow the strong finish they had to the opening frame. The Clear Lake, Man., product thought his club did a good job matching the Rebels physical style.

“They are physical team, and that is what helps them win,” said Robins, who had an assist to go with his two goals on Saturday. “We elevated our game.

Arshdeep Bains scored 21 seconds into the third for the Rebels.

“We had a physical night as well. We didn’t shy away at all and ultimately came out with these two points.”

Just 21 seconds into the third, the Rebels got on the scoreboard as Rebels star overage right-winger Arshdeep Bains scored on the power play to trim the Blades lead to 5-1. Bains was his 30^th goal of the season marking the first time in his WHL career he hit the 30-goal plateau.

Sedoff added a second power-play goal for the Rebels to round out the game’s scoring.

Nolan Maier stopped 28 shots to pick up the win in goal for the Blades (30-18-3-1). The victory was Maier’s 116^th of his regular season career, and he is just sixth goalie in the history of the WHL to reach that milestone.

The officials break up a scrum in the third period.

Maier, who is already the Blades franchise record holder for career regular season victories, is four wins away from equaling the WHL’s career regular season wins record of 120. That record is 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.

Robins said the bounce back victory for his team on Saturday was big after falling in heartbreaking style in overtime one night earlier.

Nolan Maier picked up his 116th career regular season win.

“It was awesome that we got three out of four points this weekend, but it is easily a weekend where we should have had four out of four,” said Robins. “Coming into this game and executing like we did is a must.”

Blades captain Aidan De La Gorgendiere wasn’t able to finish Saturday’s game. There was no status update for either De La Gorgendiere or Wong at the end of the game.

The Blades return to action on Wednesday when they host the Lethbridge Hurricanes (7 p.m., SaskTel Centre).

The Rebels get back it on Friday when they host the Medicine Hat Tigers (7 p.m. Red Deer time, Peavey Mart Centrium).

Robins said his Blades will continue to work on smoothing out kinks in their game in preparation for their clash with the Hurricanes.

The Blades celebrate their win on Saturday over the Rebels.

“We just have to take things one day at a time,” said Robins. “We’re going to have a couple of good practice days here right away to get right and tune things up for that game and hopefully bring back another two big points.”

NOTE – The Blades wore special jerseys for Saturday’s contest to honour the Saskatoon Police Service.

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Rebels outlast Blades in crazy high-scoring contest

Red Deer takes tiebreaking shootout 2-1 and game 7-6

The Rebels celebrate Talon Brigley’s shootout winner.

It was one of those nights that kept the fans on the edge of their seats and could potentially give coaches heart attacks.

On Tuesday night at the SaskTel Centre, the goals came in bunches like in the 1980s as the Red Deer Rebels downed the host Saskatoon Blades 7-6 after a tiebreaking shootout in a WHL regular season contest played in front of 2,741 spectators.

The Rebels took the tiebreaking shootout 2-1 with 16-year-old right-winger Talon Brigley scoring in the fourth round. Rebels 20-year-old centre Liam Keeler had Red Deer’s first tally in the tiebreaking session, while Blades star centre Tristen Robins had Saskatoon’s marker in the shootout.

There was lots of frantic action around the nets in Tuesday’s game.

Tuesday’s offensive fireworks came likely from the fact both teams started associate player call ups in net.

The Rebels, who were playing their first game since returning from their WHL Christmas break, did not have their star puck-stopping tandem available for Tuesday’s contest in 19-year-old Connor Ungar and 18-year-old Chase Coward.

Ungar was listed as being out with an undisclosed injury, while Coward is day-to-day with a lower body injury.

As a result, 17-year-old Justen Maric, who plays for the Edmonton Gregg Distributors Canadian Athletic Club under-18 AAA team, started his first career WHL game playing goal for Red Deer. 

Ben King had two goals and an assists for the Rebels.

Maric turned away three-of-six shots and was pulled after the first period.

Chase Wutzke took over in the Red Deer goal in making his WHL debut. The 15-year-old Debden, Sask., product, who plays for the Saskatoon Contacts under-18 AAA team, was greeted by cheers from family and friends in attendance.

Wutzke turned away 12-of-15 shots to playing the second, third and overtime periods for the Rebels and three of four shooters in the shootout. He picked up his first career WHL win helping the Rebels improve to 21-9-1.

Overall, Wutzke is a recent addition to the Rebels, who selected him in the second round and 40^th overall in the WHL Prospects Draft held on December 9.

Tristen Robins had a goal and five assists for the Blades.

With the Rebels being forced to dress two associate player call ups to play goal, the Blades elected to give 17-year-old associate player call up Austin Elliott his second career WHL start. Elliott is filling in for Blades backup goalie Ethan Chadwick, who is out day-to-day with a lower body injury.

Elliott, who plays junior A for the Notre Dame Hounds of the SJHL, turned away 24-of-29 shots playing the first and second periods for the Blades.

He was pulled for 20-year-old star veteran Nolan Maier at the start of the third frame. Maier turned away 12-of-13 shots playing the third period and overtime and two of four shooters in the shootout.

Kyle Crnkovic had three goals and two assists for the Blades.

Maier took the overtime setback in goal for the Blades, whose record moved to 16-13-1-1. The Yorkton, Sask., started for the Blades on Monday in a 4-1 victory over the Raiders in Prince Albert, and the Saskatoon side was originally trying to give Maier the night off on Tuesday.

Ultimately, the challenges both sides faced in goal created a situation that allowed both clubs to burn out the bulbs on the scoreboard.

The Blades opened the scoring at the 7:07 mark of the first period, while working on the power play. Stationed in the left slot, Robins one-timed a setup pass from rearguard Charlie Wright to give the host side a one-goal edge.

Liam Keeler had a goal for the Rebels on Tuesday.

Just 17 seconds later, the Rebels evened the score at 1-1, when 19-year-old star centre Ben King converted a tick-tack-toe passing play from Arshdeep Bains and Jhett Larson. King knocked home the puck from in close at the left side of the Saskatoon net.

Just 1:18 after that tally, the Blades went ahead 2-1, when star left-winger Kyle Crnkovic wristed home a shot from the point.

With 3:02 remaining in the first, the Blades struck again on the power play, when 17-year-old left-winger Brandon Lisowsky tipped home a point shot from captain Aidan De La Gorgendiere.

The second period was a wild one that attempted to knockout the scoreboard. 

Jace Isley scored the Rebels fifth goal on Tuesday.

Brigley scored to cut the Blades edge to 3-2, but the Blades replied with two straight goals to push their advantage to 5-2 as Crnkovic scored his second of the contest and Jayden Wiens potted a single on a power play.

The Rebels proceeded to score three straight to even things up at 5-5. Bains, Keeler and Jace Isley all netted singles for Red Deer in that offensive run that evened the score.

With 6.8 seconds remaining in the second, the Blades jumped back in front 6-5, when Crnkovic potted his third of the night on a backhand shot from the left side of the Red Deer net. The Chestermere, Alta., product had two assists to go with his hat trick.

Blake Stevenson looks for a scoring chance for the Rebels.

Robins made a nice pass across the face the Red Deer goal to set up Crnkovic for his third tally of the night. That set up was the fifth assist of the contest for Robins.

De La Gorgendiere finished the night collecting three assists for the Blades.

At the 10:42 mark of the third, the Rebels evened things up at 6-6 scoring on the power play.

Rebels right-winger Blake Stevenson took a shot from the right boards that deflected off the boards behind the Saskatoon net right to King at the left side of the goal. King popped home the equalizer into an empty cage for his second tally of the night.

King had an assist to go with his two goals on Tuesday.

In overtime, Wutzke came up with three clutch saves to prevent the Blades from pulling out the win including turning away Blades defenceman Rhett Rhinehart close in off a backhand shot.

The Rebels celebrate their win on Tuesday.

Defenceman Kyle Masters had the Rebels best chance to score in overtime when he wired a shot off the post of the Saskatoon goal.

That set the stage for the dramatics of the tiebreaking shootout, where Red Deer pulled out the win.

With the crazy victory under their belts, the Rebels return to action on Wednesday when they travel to Prince Albert to take on the 12-15-1-1 Raiders (7 p.m., Art Hauser Centre).

The Blades will try and get back in the win column on Thursday when they host the Raiders (7 p.m., SaskTel Centre).

As for Tuesday’s clash between the Blades and Rebels, the fans definitely got full value for their ticket purchases on that night.

Blades, Tigers, Cougars combine on massive three-way trade

Kyren Gronick made his debut for the Blades on Tuesday.

The Saskatoon Blades, Medicine Hat Tigers and Prince George Cougars combined on a massive three-team trade on Tuesday involving six players and five WHL Prospects Draft selections.

In the deal, the Blades received 17-year-old right-winger Kyren Gronick from the Cougars, 17-year-old defenceman Ryan Nolan from the Tigers and a fourth round selection in the 2023 WHL Prospects Draft from the Tigers.

Gronick, who stands 5-foot-11 and weighs 180 pounds, played 21 games for the Cougars this season posting three goals and six assists. The Regina, Sask., product made his debut for the Blades on Tuesday as they fell 7-6 after a tiebreaking shootout to the Red Deer Rebels at the SaskTel Centre.

Gronick was held without a point in his first game with the Blades.

Nolan, who stands 6-feet and weighs 156 pounds, appeared in eight games this season with the Tigers and didn’t register any points.

The Tigers received 19-year-old right-winger Brendan Lee from the Blades, 17-year-old defenceman Pavel Bocharov from the Blades and fifth round selection in the 2025 WHL Prospects Draft from the Cougars in the deal.

Lee, who stands 5-foot-11 and weighs 187 pounds, skated in 30 games for the Blades this season posting five goals and six assists.

Bocharov, who stands 6-feet and weighs 178 pounds, appeared in 30 games for the Blades this season collecting one goal and six assists.

The Cougars received 17-year-old left-winger Cayden Glover from the Tigers, centre Carlin Dezainde, who turns 17-years-old on Wednesday, from the Tigers, a conditional second round selection in the 2023 WHL Prospect Draft from the Tigers, a third round pick in the 2023 WHL Prospects Draft from the Blades and a seventh round pick in the 2025 WHL Prospects Draft from the Blades.

Glover, who stands 6-foot-1 and weighs 186 pounds, has appeared in 15 games for the Tigers this season collecting three goals and two assists.

Dezainde, who stands 5-foot-11 and weighs 161 pounds, has appeared in 21 games for the Tigers collecting two assists.

The WHL trade deadline for the current campaign is January 17, 2022.

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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