It took 65 minutes of hockey and six rounds of shooters for the Penticton Vees to spoil the party at the Art Hauser Centre on Friday.
Vees forward Louis Wehmann did what five Penticton skaters before him couldn’t when he slid the puck under Prince Albert Raider goaltender Michal Orsulak’s arm to secure a 3-2 shoot-out win. The goal sent Raider fans to the exits, and sparked a lengthy celebration from a small but vocal contingent of Vees fans who followed the team on their prairie road trip.
“Ors (Orsulak) made a lot of saves,” said Raiders forward Braeden Cootes, who was one of the six Prince Albert shooters that couldn’t beat Vees goaltender Andrew Reyelts. “We didn’t really help him out there. It was two good team playing and going at it. It was a good game. We just couldn’t find a way.”
Cootes, Aiden Oiring, Jonah Sivertson, Alisher Sarkenov, Daxon Rudolph, and Brandon Gorzynski all had a crack at Reyelts during the shootout. Oiring came the closest to scoring, but lost the handle on a deke after a nifty change of direction that had Reyelts sliding out of the crease.
The Vee netminder responded with big stops on Cootes, Sivertson, and Sarkenov before Rudolph fired high and wide on his chance. Gorzynski tried to go five-hole, but Reyelts shut the door. It was the last chance the Raiders would get.
“I know mine, he (Reyelts) got a good poke-check on me,” Cootes said. “I was just trying to wait him out. Their goalie was great in the shootout. He came out, (and) challenged hard, which is a good idea because it’s kind of hard to deke when the ice is like that from that point in the game, but yeah, he was good.”
At the other end, left winger Brittan Alstead started things off for Penticton by firing high and wide of the net. Orsulak responded with blocker saves on Ryden Evers and Brady Birnie, plus pad stops on Jacob Kvasnicka and Ethan Weber, setting up showdown with Wehmann.
The Vees winger froze Orsulak with a fake wrist shot in the slot before deking to his left and sliding the puck under the Raider goaltender’s arm.
“I like to just have my move picked out and go with it, so I wasn’t reading too much when I got the puck,” Wehmann said afterward. “I was really just focused on picking up that puck at centre ice—making sure I don’t bobble it or anything like that—and then blacked out a little bit there.”
While the Vees celebrated the victory, Wehmann credited Reyelts for stymying the Raiders and keeping Penticton in the game.
“I feel for those guys,” Wehmann said. “I know how hard it is to score on him in practice. We had so much faith in him going into that shootout. We know how hard it is to score on him and he was just phenomenal.”
Reyelts was fantastic Friday night, but Orsulak might have been even better. The Czech netminder stopped 40 of 42 shots he faced before the shootout, with the best coming in the last 10 minutes of the third period. Osulak lost his stick, but recovered to make a sprawling point-blank save on Vees defenceman Doogan Pederson.
“He’s a great goalie,” Cootes said. “We didn’t help him out there…. He made enough saves, for sure. We had to bury one there, but he was great all game.”
The two teams were tied at one heading into the third period thanks to goals from Cootes and Matteo Danis.
Sivertson put the Raiders ahead early in the third when he fired a wrist shot into the top left-hand corner after barreling around a Penticton defender who lost and edge and fell to the ice. However, Vees defenceman Nolan Stevenson tied the game up on a point shot that beat a screen Orsulak on the power play with 7:18 remaining in the period.
The two teams then played a cautious overtime with only one Grade A scoring chance. That came when the puck bounced to a wide-open Evers in the slot, but the Vees centre fired a shot well over the net.
The three-on-three play was a dramatic departure from the relentless checking of the first three periods.
“That’s a playoff style game: hard-skating, fast-checking,” Raiders head coach Ryan McDonald said. “Pucks, you needed to get them behind and you needed to get on your hunt and you needed to make sure your angles were above and you needed to have good sticks to extend plays in the offensive zone…. Just a hard-fought slugfest. Tip your cap to them (Penticton). They played a really good game tonight.”
Despite the loss, McDonald said the Raiders learned plenty of lessons. He said their puck management has to be better, especially against a team with tremendous outside speed like Penticton, and they need to get more pucks to the net. He also credited the Vees for clogging up centre ice, and forcing turnovers.
However, McDonald is confident the Raiders will learn those lessons, and make the necessary improvements.
“You want to get tested and this was really good test for us tonight,” he said. “We take things day-by-day, so right now we’re going to worry about our rest and recovery so we can be prepared for tomorrow.”
The Raiders are back on the ice Saturday night when they face the Prince George Cougars at the Art Hauser Centre. Puck drop is 7 p.m.
News and Notes:
• Friday’s victory means the Penticton Vees set a new record for most wins by a CHL team in their inaugural season, breaking the old mark set by the QMJHL’s Longueuil Chevaliers in 1982-83. Wehmann said the record is something they’ve talked about in the dressing room, and it feels good to finally have it. “I don’t think many people thought at the start of the year that it would be something we could possibly accomplish, but now it’s here and it seems a lot more realistic,” he said. “We’re proud of it, but now we’re going to move on to the next game.”
• Cootes first period goal came on the only Raiders power play of the game. The Vees had four power play opportunities.
• The two teams were almost even in the face-off circle, with Penticton winning 25 draws to Prince Albert’s 24. Cootes was the Raiders’ best face-off man, winning 8 of 10, while Ryden Evers won 12 of 24 for Penticton.
• The announced attendance was 2,793.
Daily Herald Three Stars
1 – Michal Orsulak (Prince Albert) – held Prince Albert in the game during some frantic moments the first 60 minutes, and gave the Raiders plenty of chances to win in the shootout.
2 – Andrew Reyelts (Penticton) – wasn’t as busy as Orsulak, but made some big third period saves keep the Vees within one and was perfect in the shootout.
3 – Matteo Danis (Penticton) – pounced on a rebound to score Penticton’s opening goal in the second period, and assisted on Stevenson’s game-tying marker in the third. Was a threat in the offensive zone all night.
