It seemed only fitting that with a major blizzard bearing down on southern Manitoba, the Moose Jaw Warriors would weather the storm early against the Brandon Wheat Kings before picking up a win on Tuesday night.
And with the 5-2 victory in Western Hockey League action, the Warriors find themselves in the driver’s seat when it comes to earning home-ice advantage in the first round of the Eastern Conference playoffs.
Moose Jaw improved to 37-23-3-3 with the win and moved two points clear of Saskatoon for fourth place, with the Blades having a single game remaining against Brandon on Friday night. The Warriors also moved five points clear of the Wheat Kings, who have only two games remaining on their schedule.
Like their previous meeting with Brandon last Saturday, the Warriors got off to a bit of a slow start before finding their stride as the Wheat Kings ran into some discipline issues.
Moose Jaw received the first two power plays of the game in the first period, but it was Brandon who had the majority of the scoring chances -- including a near-goal with 8:30 remaining that went to review before being disallowed.
Brandon had a golden chance of their own on the power play two minutes later with a two-man advantage for 35 seconds, but the Warriors would escape with no damage.
The Warriors got on the board with 3:04 remaining in the first, with Eric Alarie finishing off a flurry of scoring chances just after their third power play of the period expired.
Jagger Firkus then put Moose Jaw ahead 2-0 with just over a minute to play, and it’ll undoubtedly show up in the WHL Top-10 Plays of the Week.
The 17-year-old sniper picked up a neutral zone turnover along the boards, broke all the way into the Brandon zone to the goal line before cutting around a Brandon defender, across the net and tucking the puck behind Brandon’s Ethan Kruger.
The goal gave Firkus 36 on the season and saw him hit the 80-point mark.
Bryan Danielson pulled Brandon back within one with eight minutes gone in the second, scoring a power play marker to finish off a string of Wheat King chances in the Warriors’ zone.
The two teams then exchanged goals over the next two minutes, first when Ryder Korczak picked up a turnover in the slot and put a quick shot home. Not 40 seconds later, Nolan Ritchie was the beneficiary of a Warriors turnover, getting Brandon back within one.
All told, the three goals were 1:36 apart.
Things settled down until 5:20 had passed in the third when the Warriors regained their two goal lead. Brayden Yager finished off a three-on-two break by taking a perfect backdoor pass from Alarie and tapping the puck home.
With just over a minute remaining in the game, Carl Tetachuk made his bid for a spot in the WHL nightly highlight reel. The Warriors’ goaltender made an incredible diving save to absolutely rob Nolan Ritchie with his outstretched glove as Brandon pushed for the tying goal.
Tetachuk would finish the night with 29 saves.
Atley Calvert scored an empty net goal with 1:21 remaining to finish things off.
Korczak ended up with a three-point night, adding a pair of assists to his second-period goal.
The Warriors are back in action on Friday night when they travel to Lethbridge before wrapping up their regular season in Regina on Sunday.
