P.A. Mintos beat Tisdale Trojans in overtime to tie semi-final series 1-1
The Prince Albert Mintos defeated the Tisdale Trojans 4-3 in overtime at the Tisdale Recplex on Thursday night, but the win came at a cost.
Seven minutes into the first period Mintos defenceman Braden Schneider received a major penalty and game misconduct for head contact on Trojans captain Kris Bzdel. Schneider had already received game misconducts and head contact penalties during the regular season and a suspension is now pending. Mintos manager Don Fauchoux said, “He’ll be gone for some time.” The Mintos are already without regular season goal scoring leader Kyrell Sopotyk, who on Thursday served the first game of a five-game suspension for checking from behind in Game 1.
“(Bzdel) had his head down. Braden had his arm maybe up a bit and they called it a head shot and unfortunately the guy was hurt a little bit too much and they had to give him a lot of extra care to get him off the ice and hopefully he’ll be fine. So that put a little damper on it early,” Fauchoux said.
“After that hit there was a length of time there that the player was on the ice, so both teams went to their dressing rooms.”
When play resumed the Trojans scored twice in just over two minutes on the ensuing major penalty to jump to a quick 2-0 lead. Tisdale outshot P.A. 12-4 in the period and carried the two-goal lead into the second period.
In the second frame the Mintos fought back, with Kyle Gray and Mitchell Girolami scoring two goals 20 seconds apart to tie the score. With less than two minutes remaining in the second P.A.’s Kade McMillen beat Tisdale goalie Ethan Anders to give the Mintos their first lead of the game.
“We just need guys to step up and they all rallied around in the dressing room and we came out and we played the best we could after that,” Fauchoux said.
“We juggled things around, the coaches did a great job with moving guys around and the puck starting going our way a little bit but we outworked (Tisdale) for the rest of the game, to tell you the truth.”
The Mintos had a dominant third period, protecting their lead while outshooting the opposition 13-6. But just when it looked like the game was over, Trojan centre Taylor Schmidt scored with 10 seconds remaining in regulation to send the game to overtime. It was P.A.’s third-straight match to require extra time.
“It was back-and-forth. We had a couple extra chances but Arndt walked into a shot and it went in off Kyle Schneider and she was history from there,” Fauchoux said.
Game 3 is back at the Art Hauser Centre on Sunday night starting at 7 p.m. Fauchoux said it was important to get the win on the road, noting that if they lost in Tisdale, “We’re down 2-0 and we’re in big trouble.”
“It’s a best-of-three now,” he said.
“We’re back to having home-ice advantage. I don’t know if it’s an advantage with us — we’re 3-0 in Tisdale this year and we’re 1-2 at home against Tisdale, it’s kind of weird that way — but we’re going to have the crowd support here Sunday night and hopefully we can pull that off.”
Game Summary
Prince Albert 4, Tisdale 3 (OT)
Best-of-five series is tied 1-1
First Period
- Tisdale, Schmidt 2 (unassisted) 7:43 (pp)
- Tisdale, Frey 2 (Schmidt, Bollefer) 9:55 (pp)
Second Period
- Prince Albert, Gray 1 (Barlage, Arndt) 14:25
- Prince Albert, Girolami 2 (Matechuk) 14:45
- Prince Albert, McMillen 2 (Zimmerman, Girolami) 18:08
Third Period
- Tisdale, Schmidt 3 (Hawes, Marleau) 19:50
Ovetime
- Prince Albert, K. Schneider 1 (Arndt, Gray) 4:09
Goalies: Prince Albert — Cale Elder, 28 saves (W, 4-2-0); Tisdale — Ethan Anders, 32 saves (L, 4-3-0).
