While the Warriors dropped a 4-2 decision in their first exhibition game of the campaign -- and their first game since the Sask Hockey Association reached Phase Two of the Return-to-Hockey plan -- the effort they put together at the Bert Hunt Arena will almost certainly pay off in the future.
“I was happy with how the game turned out in all honesty,” said Warriors head coach Todd Cole. “This was the first game we’ve played in six months and I was happy with how they played. There’s some small things we can improve on obviously, but it’s all correctable stuff. Some of it’s mental, some of it’s physical, but we’re pretty excited where we are going forward.”
Kierin Osberg and Chance Cole scored for the Warriors, who were tied 1-1 after the first and trailed 2-1 through two. They had their share of chances in the final period, too, but couldn’t close the gap.
That’s what made things all the more positive for the local squad -- a break here and there, and there could have been a far different result.
“We do have a pretty highly skilled team and we had our opportunities,” coach Cole said. “We had a couple bounces that didn’t go our way, and there were some bad bounces that ended up in the back of our net. That’s the game of hockey, it’s chances.”
The important thing is to use this first result to their advantage going forward -- the U15 age group has seen some lean years when it comes to wins in recent SAAHL seasons, and the goal is to change all that in the 2020-21 campaign.
“That’s what I told the boys, we’ve been taking it on the chin for a while,” Cole said. “So we want to change that and get these kids some wins under their belt. As long as we have the work ethic and work hard for 60 minutes, we’ll see positive results.”
