The Warriors kicked off their Saskatchewan Male AAA Hockey League campaign at Mosaic Place with a come-from-behind 5-4 shootout win over the Estevan Bears on Wednesday night and followed Saturday with a 4-3 victory over the Regina Pat Canadians, again in a shootout.
It’s as positive a start as can be for the only team to reach the league final the last time the SMAAAHL played a full season, and one head coach Trevor Weisgerber hopes is just a sign of things to come.
“It’s nice to show that we can win some games early, and some close games,” Weisgerber said. “We’re happy with the guys and we’re happy with the two wins, we’re still working through things and we’re getting better every game. The nice thing is the progression and the things we’re working on we’re bringing into games now, and it’s only going to get better.”
Against Estevan, neither team had much time to work on their five-on-five play, as the two teams combined for no less than 22 minor penalties -- Estevan would go 2-for-8 on the man advantage, Moose Jaw 2-for-an-astonishing-14.
The Bears took a 3-1 lead out of the first period, with Daxin Peterson scoring Moose Jaw’s lone goal, before Orin Olson scored with 24 seconds remaining in the second to make it 4-2 through two.
There the score remained until Brady Wilson got the Warriors within one with 4:12 remaining in the game and Jackson Allan tied things up with 1:16 to play. Allan then capped things off with the lone goal of the shootout.
Olson added three assists to his goal, Rowan Calvert had three helpers. Ethan Fechter made 27 saves to earn the win.
“We played really well in the third, but in the first just with the home opener and things, we were standing around and give them credit, they played well,” Weisgerber said. “But at least in the third we had some pushback and scored some timely goals late and ended up winning in a shootout, which was a nice start to the season.”
That set the stage for the first meeting with the Regina Pat Canadians, who came into Mosaic Place with an undefeated 3-0 record.
The Warriors raced out to a 3-1 lead in the first period on goals from Calvert, Peterson and McKale Paul before Regina rallied to tie things up with the only two goals of the second period. That set the stage for another shootout, this time with Blake Betson and Kayden Ostrom scoring to give the Warriors the 3-2 win.
“We were happy with the start even though we gave up one early,” Weisgerber said. “After that we outshot them and it was looking good, but in the second we had some penalty trouble again that cost us and they ended up tying it up. At the end of the day we were pretty happy with how we played.”
With two hard-fought wins under their belt, the plan now is to keep on keeping on and turn the focus to Tuesday when they host the Swift Current Legionnaires at 7 p.m. at Mosaic Place.
“We’re just going to try and go day-by-day here, we still have lots to work on and we’re just going to keep on going through things,” Weisgerber said. “Every game we see some progression and that’s all we can ask for from our guys. The work ethic is there and the compete is there, so that’s the biggest step so far and we’ll keep working on everything else.”
