The Prince Albert Raiders return home wasn’t quite the one they were hoping for.
The Raiders dropped the second half of their home and home set with the Moose Jaw Warriors 4-1 on Friday night at the Art Hauser Centre. Raider coach Marc Habscheid was not happy with his team’s performance after the game.
“We got schooled. I didn’t like our forward group one bit”, Habscheid said. “Our four defenceman are as good as anyone in the league, and we couldn’t get out of our own end. There was no forecheck. It was one and done.”
Ozzy Wiesblatt opened the scoring for the Raiders as he tallied a shorthanded marker on a wraparound beauty past Warrior goalie Carl Tetachuk 4:12 into the game.
Although he did score the only goal for the Raiders on Friday, Wiesblatt still wasn’t happy with his performance.
“We just have to be better in all areas, and it starts with our compete level,” he said after the game. “We weren’t competing at all today, and that starts with guys like me. I have to be a lot better.”
After giving up the opening goal, the Warriors seemed to have tied the game at the 8:28 mark in the opening frame. Jagger Firkus looked to have netter a goal for the visitors, but after a video review lasting over three minutes, the goal call was overturned because the net had come off before the puck entered the net.
The Raiders would go on to have two consecutive powerplays midway through the first period. They moved the puck around well and Raider captain Kaiden Guhle looked to be in mid season form manning the point.
However, they would fail to find the back of the net on both man advantages, keeping the game at 1-0 after the first twenty minutes. The closest chance the Warriors got to beating Carter Serhyenko was when Denton Mateychuk drilled the post on a Moose Jaw powerplay with just over a minute left in the period.
The lone goal in the second came at the 7:37 mark, when Martin Rysavy was just able to put a shot past Carter Seryhenko to tie the game at 1-1. Later in the period, the Warriors were controlling the puck in the Raider zone, when a point slapshot hit Kaiden Guhle in the foot. Guile laboured through the rest of his shift, but would shake it off and head to the bench during the next stoppage.
The third period was more of the same story. Moose Jaw dominated and had the puck in the Raider zone for much of the final frame. The Warriors would take the lead on a Brayden Yager shot from the corner that somehow snuck between the pads of Serhyenko on a crazy bounce. Just three minutes later, the Warriors scored an insurance goal on a giveaway in the Raiders zone. Ryder Korczak took full advantage ripping a shot past Serhyenko’s glove.
Moose Jaw wasn’t finished there. Just 38 seconds later, Mateychuk redeemed himself after his post shot in the first. He sniped a shot to put the Warriors up by three with under ten minutes left in regulation.
Frustration started to show on the Raiders side, as they were unable to really develop any chances in the Moose Jaw end for much of the third period, and Habscheid recognized that.
“Our forwards were just not good tonight,” he said. “They didn’t create anything and tried to do everything on their own. Couldn’t make a pass, couldn’t catch a pass.”
“We have to play the right way,” Habscheid said, ahead of their preparation for Saturday’s game against Medicine Hat. “If we’re going to have a chance, we’ve got to play together. We just have to play better.”
Wiesblatt added what the team would have to do to bounce back on Saturday.
“We just have to try and go along with how we played in our last game against Moose Jaw. We were working hard all game (on Wednesday), and it came down to breakouts and stuff like that. And our forwards also have to be a lot better too.”
The Raiders will be back in action Saturday night at the Art Hauser Centre in a date with the Medicine Hat Tigers. Puck drop is at 7 pm.
Around the WHL
Arshdeep Bains scored a hat trick in Red Deer’s 8-1 thrashing of the Calgary Hitmen. Connor Ungar put in a great performance, stopping 32 of 33 Hitmen shots that came his way.
The Saskatoon Blades conitniued their hot start to the 2021-22 campaign. Kyle Crnkovic scored twice as the Blades took down the Tigers 4-0 at SaskTel Centre.
The Winnipeg Ice remain as the lone undefeated team in the Eastern Conference, as they handled the Regina Pats by a 4-2 score. A somewhat surprising story is that Connor Bedard was held off the scoresheet in the loss.
The Edmonton Oil Kings used the help of two goals from Luke Prokop to take down the Lethbridge Hurricanes on Friday night. Detroit Red Wings prospect Sebastian Cossa turned aside all 25 Hurricanes shots for his first clean slate of the season.